


Mind of a Madman

by dyingoftheday



Series: Memories [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Mental Institution, Amnesia, Case Fic, Dissociative Identity Disorder, Drug Use, F/M, Loss of Grace, M/M, Memory Loss, Psychological Drama, Slow Build, Some mentions of sex but definitely not graphic, Some violence but not super graphic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-07
Updated: 2014-09-05
Packaged: 2018-02-12 06:08:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 37,851
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2098515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dyingoftheday/pseuds/dyingoftheday
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Dean wakes up in Glenwood Springs Psychiatric Hospital with no memory of who he is or how he got there, he thinks he's died and gone to hell. The doctors assure him that the memories he has of hunting monsters are delusions, and he might believe them if not for the strange man who appears in his room one night wearing a ratty trench coat and claiming to be an angel. But when he can't even trust his own mind, can Dean trust someone whom no one else can see?</p>
<p>To make matters worse, people in the hospital are starting to disappear under mysterious circumstances. And if Dean doesn't do something soon, everyone he cares about could be in danger.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Dead or Alive

**Author's Note:**

> Some of the details about psychiatric care in this story are based on practices that are now outdated. They were included for the sake of the plot and should not be taken as an accurate representation of life in a modern-day mental hospital.
> 
> Also, slight spoiler alert: some characters have been purposefully (on my part) misdiagnosed with mental illnesses due to their conditions actually being caused by things that are a bit more, well...supernatural. No disrespect is intended towards people with mental illnesses, and the opinions of the characters about mental illness/patients/hospitals do not reflect my own.
> 
> Huge thank you to my beta reader, Ashley (cloudbruja06), who has been both incredibly kind and incredibly helpful with cleaning up this story.

Dean is dead.

Or, at least, he’s fairly certain that he’s dead when he opens his eyes and sees the plain white walls surrounding him. The smell of medicine and disinfectant burns his nostrils, confirming his suspicion that he is in a hospital. Which, considering the fact that he hates hospitals almost as much as he hates airplanes, means that he is definitely in hell.

_Again,_ whispers a voice in the back of his mind, though he isn’t sure why. He’s fairly certain that he has never been to hell.

There’s a knock on the door, but before he has the chance to answer, it’s already being opened. A blonde girl with a too-large grin comes in carrying a tray of food.

“Rise and shine, Mr. Winchester! Time for breakfast!”

She plops the tray on his lap and Dean looks down at his meager meal. A pill, a glass of water, a piece of badly burnt toast, and a bowl of something gray stare back at him. He looks back to the girl, who is now busily picking up trash around the room and humming to herself. Dean thinks about asking her why he appears to be in a hospital, how he got there, what the frankly enormous pill on his breakfast tray is for.

“Who are you?” he asks instead.

The girl stops to look at him, a crumpled newspaper still gripped in her hand and hovering a few inches above the trashcan. For a second he thinks he sees her smile falter, but it’s as big and bright as ever before he can be sure.

“I’m Becky,” she says. “I’ve been your nurse for a little over a month. Did you have another memory lapse?”

“Memory lapse?”

“I’ll take that as a yes.” She drops the newspaper into the garbage can and walks closer to Dean’s bed, pulling a chart off the end and flipping through it. “What’s the last thing you remember?”

He has a moment of panic when he realizes that he doesn’t know the answer. He tries thinking back to his childhood and working his way up, but his entire life has the feeling of a movie he’d seen many years ago. He remembers the basic feel, a few names and faces, his mother, his father, his little brother, but every time he tries to think about a specific event, he can’t quite grasp it. After a few deep breaths to calm himself, he says something he’s sure will get him a funny look from the nurse. “Where am I?”

The look on Becky’s face is less amused and more concerned than he expected. “I’m going to go find Dr. Fuller. I’ll be right back.” She exits the room before poking her head back inside and giving him a look that is somehow both friendly and threatening. “Don’t forget to take your pill.”

When Dean is sure she is gone, he takes the pill off his tray and hides it in his pillow case. He isn’t taking anything until he gets some answers.

Becky comes back a few moments later, this time followed by a balding, bespectacled man wearing a white coat that has _Aaron Fuller, M.D._ sewn into it. He is staring down at the chart Becky took from Dean’s bed. “Well Mr. Winchester, I understand you’ve suffered another memory lapse.” Dean wishes they would stop saying that. “Can you tell me the last thing you remember?”

This time, he’d seen the question coming and had tried to prepare for it with a good lie, only to find he couldn’t think of one. He gives the only answer he can. “I…I don’t know.”

“Okay,” says Dr. Fuller, scribbling something on his clipboard. “What do you remember? People, places…anything?”

“Sammy,” Dean says without hesitation. “I remember my little brother, Sammy. And my mom and dad, and my…uncle? Bob or something.”

“Anything else? Do you remember what you did with these people?”

“Me and my dad and Sammy, we used to…I think we used to hunt together?”

“What would you hunt? Deer? Turkey?”

“No, nothing like that. We—” An image of a man—is it a man?—with yellow eyes flashes across his vision. His father and his little brother are there too, covered in blood, and Dean has to suppress a scream at the pain that shoots through his head.

Becky is at his side in an instant, asking if he is okay. She sounds like she’s underwater.

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine,” Dean manages. “Headache.”

If Becky still looks worried, Dr. Fuller doesn’t seem to notice. “What was that you were saying about hunting?”

“I…nothing. I don’t remember what we used to hunt.”

“Okay. Anything else you remember?”

“No. That’s all.”

The doctor peers at him over his glasses. “Nothing about yourself? Hobbies, interests, things you like or dislike?”

“Other than disliking this place? No, not really.”

“What about your name?”

He opens his mouth to ask what kind of question that is. Of course he knows his own name. Only, before he can say as much, he realizes that he doesn’t. He remembers his last name. _Winchester._ But does he actually remember, or is that just because he heard the doctor and Becky say it? And where is his first name? He’s sure it’s somewhere. The name is there, heavy on his tongue. He can feel it like a well-worn necklace that finally breaks or gets lost, leaving its owner feeling naked.

“Well,” says Dr. Fuller, taking off his glasses to rub the corners of his eyes. “This is certainly the biggest lapse in memory I’ve ever seen with you, Dean.” Dean almost jumps for joy at the mention of his name. Because of course that’s his name. He doesn’t know how he could ever forget. “I suppose I should fill you in on the basics. You’re at Glenwood Springs Psychiatric Hospital. You’ve been here for about eight years now. I’ve been your main doctor for three of those years. My name is Dr. Fuller, and Betty over there is your nurse.”

“Becky.”

“What?”

“I said Becky, sir. My name is Becky.”

“Right, right. Anyway, does any of this ring a bell?”

“No,” Dean says. “Wait a minute. Did you say I’ve been in this place for eight _years_?”

“That’s right. You checked yourself in on…” he checks the clipboard “May thirteenth, 2006.”

“Checked myself…? Listen buddy, you must have the wrong guy. I would never—” Another memory flashes across his mind, this time of himself, filthy and drunk and alone, stumbling through the doors of the mental hospital, begging someone, anyone, to tell him what was going on, tell him who he was, make it make sense again. This memory doesn’t hurt his head, but it does hurt his pride.

“I…why would I…?”

“I think it’s best if you let the rest come back to you naturally. I’ve got to go see some other patients, but I’ll be back to check on you later. Betsy, keep an eye on him?”

“Yes, sir,” Becky says, visibly deflating but not bothering to correct him this time.

“Sounds like the doc’s the one with the memory problem, if you ask me,” Dean says when he is gone. That earns him a smile from Becky, though it’s much smaller than the one she had been sporting earlier.

“People just have trouble remembering my name because I’m still pretty new here,” she says, going back to cleaning the room. “Only been here for forty-six days! I’m sure they’ll start remembering soon.”

“Well someone’s got to remember your name. Do I usually remember it? You know, when I don’t wake up with amnesia?”

“Hard to say. You don’t talk much.” He is about to ask what she means by that when her overly-enthusiastic smile suddenly morphs into a goofy grin. “Chuck remembers my name though. He says ‘Hi Becky’ every time I sit next to him in the cafeteria.”

“Is Chuck a doctor or a nurse?” Dean asks, taking a cautious bite of the least-black corner of his toast. It’s cold and tastes the way that cardboard smells.

“Oh, neither,” Becky says. “He’s a paranoid schizophrenic.”

Dean nearly chokes. “You telling me you’ve got the hots for a mental patient?”

“Wha…I…I do not have the… _hots_ for him.” Her cheeks turn pink. “But if I did, it would be because he’s smart and cute and funny, and because I, unlike some people, am completely accepting of others’ quirks. Even if those quirks include delusions of grandeur.”

“Delusions of grand what?”

“Grandeur.” Seeing Dean’s confused expression, she rolls her eyes. “It means he thinks he’s God.”

“He thinks he’s _God_?”

“Shh! Keep it down! I wasn’t supposed to tell you that. Chuck’s a little sensitive about it. Do me a favor and don’t repeat that to anyone?”

“I won’t,” Dean promises. “Probably won’t remember it soon anyway.”

She gives him a grateful look before making him get up so she can change the sheets, which of course leads to the discovery of the pill he hid in his pillow. Becky glares at him, and Dean has the manners to look sheepish.

“In my defense, I didn’t know where I was or what that might be for,” he says. “Actually, I still don’t know what that’s for.”

“Anxiety,” she says, producing another pill from her pocket as if she expected this to happen. Dean thinks she probably did. “You get panic attacks.”

“Is that all?” Dean says, accepting the pill and swallowing it down with some water, if for no other reason than the fact that Becky is still glaring at him. “Didn’t think they’d put you in the loony bin for just panic attacks.”

“Not just panic attacks. You also have DID.”

“What’s that?”

“Dissociative Identity Disorder. It means…you know what, I probably shouldn’t tell you. Dr. Fuller seemed to think you should try to remember stuff on your own.”

“Aw, come on, that’s not that personal. Just making sense of a bunch of medical mumbo-jumbo. It’ll hardly mean a thing to me, and I’ll probably forget it again anyway.” Becky still looks uncertain, so Dean throws in a “Please, Becky?” and he knows he has won.

“Well…basically, you’re like two different people wrapped up into one. Some days I come in and you’re just Dean, the small town mechanic from Kansas. But other days…well other days you think you’re someone else entirely.”

“And who’s that?”

Becky bites her lip. “A hero.”

Dean stares at her for a moment before bursting into laughter. “A hero? What, like Batman or something? Tell me I don’t think I’m Batman.”

“Not a superhero, dummy. Just, well, a hero. Someone who fights demons and vampires and ghosts, kicking butt and taking names and all that jazz.”

“Huh. A hero. You know, that actually sounds pretty badass. Do I get a sidekick?”

“Well, there’s your brother. He hunts with you. Or…I mean…”

Dean doesn’t hear what Becky means to say, because his vision is suddenly flooded with images of his brother passed out in the driver’s seat of a car, blood pouring from his forehead. His dad is there too, looking about as bad, but all Dean can think is _Sammy, why’d it have to be Sammy?_

“He’s dead,” Dean says. Becky stops talking. “Sammy’s dead. My dad too. They’re both dead, aren’t they?”

“Maybe I should go…”

“No! Not until you answer me! Is Sam dead?”

Becky looks terrified, and Dean realizes that he is squeezing her shoulders. “Yes.”

“And my dad?”

“Him too.”

“Fuck.” He slaps his forgotten breakfast tray off the bed. It hits the wall with a satisfying _clang,_ and the gray sludge dribbles down to the floor. “Fuck!” he repeats.

“I’m…just going to go get the doctor again,” Becky says, rushing out of the room right as Dean slams his fist into the wall. It leaves a dent. He punches it again and again and again, until the floor is littered with crumbled plaster and his knuckles are dripping blood. He doesn’t care. He doesn’t feel it. All he can feel is the pain in his head and the pressure in his chest, squeezing, clenching, making it hard to breathe. Words run through his mind like poison being pumped through his veins, killing him with every beat of his heart. _Sam is dead, Sam is dead, Sam is dead._ Over and over again.

He barely registers the voices calling his name, the hands wrapping around his wrists and pushing him towards the bed. He continues to punch the wall, and when he’s moved away from it, he punches anything else he can find. He feels a pinch in his upper arm and vaguely registers the needle being pulled out of it. He wonders what it’s for.

His vision goes black.

*

Castiel is alive.

Barely, it seems. His vessel aches all over and he misses his wings desperately, but his heart is beating and his lungs fill with air and his feet continue to drag him forward, inch by inch, towards the setting sun.

He thinks bitterly that he used to operate just fine without needing to do any of those things.

He has already forgotten how he got there and how long it has been since he arrived. _Dean,_ he thinks, latching onto what he remembers most, his reason for being there. It helps a little.

It’s growing darker by the second, and he is about to decide that he needs to stop and rest for the night when he sees it: a large, gray sign at the top of the hill bearing the words “Glenwood Springs Psychiatric Hospital.” He’s doesn’t think much of it at first, but then he realizes he’s seen the words before.

It seems as likely a place as any.

He closes his eyes and prays—to whom he isn’t sure—that Dean will be there.

He drags his body the last few yards.

*

The first thing Dean notices when he wakes up is that he’s hungry. The second thing he notices is that it’s nearly dark outside.

The third thing he notices is that he’s not alone.

There is a man standing in the darkest corner of the room, pressed against the wall as if he is trying to be inconspicuous and failing miserably. His hair is disheveled, and an oversized trench coat hangs loosely on his frame. By all accounts, he should look completely ridiculous.

_There you are,_ Dean thinks strangely.

“Who are you?” Dean says.

The man doesn’t answer. Instead, he walks towards the bed and places two fingers on Dean’s forehead.

Dean bats them away. “The hell do you think you’re doing?”

If the man is annoyed by having his hand slapped and his motives questioned, he doesn’t show it. His face is the picture of calm, though Dean thinks he sees sadness in his eyes that shouldn’t be visible in the dim light of the room. His hand is steady as he replaces his fingers on Dean’s head.

“Shh, quiet now,” he says. The man’s voice is deep and gravely, and for some reason it calms him. “You need to sleep, Dean.”

The last thing Dean thinks before the man and the room fade into darkness is that it’s the first time all day his name has felt like his own.


	2. A Day in the Life

Becky, as it turns out, doesn’t resent Dean for his behavior. Or, if she does, she does a good job of hiding it. She comes in the next morning just as perky as the day before, and Dean thinks that he has never met a person who smiles so much in his whole life, though he can’t quite decide whether her smile is kind or unnerving. He decides it’s probably both.

“That’s strange,” she says as she unwraps the bandages from his knuckles, apparently put there some time after he passed out the day before. “Yesterday your hand was all bloody and bruised from punching the wall, but it seems fine now.”

Dean looks down at his hand—which has, in fact, completely healed—and silently agrees. It is weird, but something in his brain is telling him not to say so. “Yeah, well. Quick healer I guess,” he says instead. Becky raises her eyebrows and he changes the subject. “So what are the plans for today, Beck?”

Becky beams, and Dean wonders if the nickname was a mistake. “Well you missed your checkup with Dr. Sands yesterday, but seeing as how you probably don’t remember enough to talk for very long, we’ll just keep the usual fifteen minute block for today’s appointment. Oh, and Dr. MacLeod wants to speak with you about your most recent memory lapse. That’ll be just after lunch. Then you have some free time to spend either in the recreation center or in your room before group therapy at five and dinner at six.”

“I’m sorry, group what now?”

“I know, I know, you like to be left alone. But you have to come out of your room and socialize sometime. Believe it or not, you have it pretty lucky. Most patients don’t get a room to themselves. I mean, unless they’re sent to solitary confinement.”

“Yeah, I’m downright blessed.”

Becky either doesn’t pick up on the sarcasm or chooses to ignore it. “Now hurry up and finish your breakfast. You meet with Dr. Sands in less than ten minutes. Did you take your pill?”

“Yep,” Dean lies, having hidden it in his oatmeal. They leave Dean’s room and Becky leads him down the hall.

“Hey Becky?” The words leave Dean’s mouth almost of their own accord.

“Hmm?”

“Does anyone come into the patients' rooms to check on them at night? Like a security guard or something?”

“Well we do have guards, but the most they ever do is walk past the rooms. Everyone’s room gets locked at night, so there’s no reason to go into any of them unless a patient is having a problem. Why?”

“No reason,” Dean says instinctively, then decides that there’s no real reason to lie about this. Sure, he might sound crazy, but as he’s already in a mental hospital, he figures that’s a moot point. “Actually, I think I saw someone in my room last night. A man. I guess I could’ve been dreaming, but it didn’t feel like it.”

“What’d he look like?”

“Uh, tallish. Probably around my height. Dark hair that looks to be in serious need of a comb, blue eyes…silly looking trench coat.”

“Sounds dreamy.”

“I never said that.”

“Not out loud, no.”

“Do you know who he is or not?”

“I can’t think of any patients or hospital employees that fit that description, but…”

“But?”

Becky chews her lip, knowing she’s already said too much. “Well, it’s just…you might have mentioned him before.”

“I have?” Dean stops in his tracks. “Oh no, he’s not one of those freaky ghosts or something super-me seems to think I hunt, is he?”

“All I know is that you see him sometimes and no one else ever does.”

“Great. So I can’t remember my own life but I’m remembering people who never existed in the first place. That’s just swell.”

She stops abruptly in front of a door that looks exactly like every other door they’ve passed. “Here we are.” She ushers him into the room and leaves.

Dr. Sands is red-haired and unbelievably hot. Dean might be attracted to her if he didn’t feel some sort of inexplicable disgust for her the moment he walks into her office and is met with her pretty (if not creepy) smile.

_Is everyone here contractually obligated to smile like that?_ Dean wonders.

Unlike Becky, however, Dr. Sands has no awkwardness or over-enthusiasm. Despite the fact that her smile barely changes throughout the entire meeting, she somehow manages to put ice into every word she says.

“Dean. So good to see you.” She greets him as if they are old friends. Dean gets the distinct feeling that they are not. “I heard about your complications yesterday. I trust you’re feeling better now?”

“Uh, yeah. Much better.”

“That’s great. Still no memories?”

“None but the ones I told the doc and Becky about already.” Which is a lie, but those are the only memories he feels like sharing at the moment.

“Mmhm.” She scribbles something on her clipboard. “And how about your anger?”

“My what?”

“Dean,” she says, looking up from her notes and folding her hands together. “You haven’t been a patient here for eight years simply because of your memory problems and your insistence that demons and monsters are real.”

“It’s because I’m so damn handsome that you can’t bear to see me go, right?”

Dr. Sands raises an eyebrow but doesn’t answer his question. “As you may have already noticed, you’re prone to severe panic attacks. But even more troublesome are your tendencies towards extreme anger and aggression when faced with situations that make you uncomfortable. Are you aware that you put a hole in the wall yesterday and injured yourself in the process?”

He glances down at his unblemished knuckles and winces. “Yeah, sorry about that.”

“Don’t apologize to me. I’m just worried about you. You don’t want to be transferred to solitary confinement again, do you?”

Dean’s head shoots up. “I was in solitary?”

“Yes. And I know Dr. Fuller thinks we shouldn’t tell you anything about your life that you don’t already know, but I tell you this out of concern for you, Dean. Be on your best behavior from now on, or we’ll be forced to take action.”

“But no pressure or anything.” Again, he doesn’t get a reaction. “Am I done here?” he asks.

“Unless you have something else you want to talk about. We technically have six minutes left, but I can escort you back to your room now if you wish.”

“Awesome. Thanks,” he glances at the bronze nameplate on her desk, “uh, Josie.”

“Don’t call me that,” she says, standing before leading him down the hall.

*

Castiel sits on the floor in the corner of the tiny hospital room long after the nurse leads Dean outside. He knows he’s using up energy by remaining invisible, but the door is open and he doesn’t want to risk anyone walking past and seeing him.

He curses himself for having wasted so much time already; it had been impossible for him to stay awake much longer after healing Dean the night before. He has now forgotten the names of seven of his brothers and sisters, but there are much more important things he’s worried about forgetting. He looks around for a pencil and a piece of paper but finds none. He sighs and heaves himself to his feet before wandering down the hall in search of something to write on.

By the time he finally finds a spiral notebook and a chewed-up pen in one of the patient’s rooms, he has already forgotten half of what he wanted to say. He writes down what he remembers and tucks the notebook into his pocket.

*

Lunch is carrots and something brown that might be chili, and Dean resists the urge to dump it in the garbage before looking around for a place to sit. Some of the faces he sees look vaguely familiar, but that doesn’t tell him which ones (if any) he was friends with.

After a few moments, he sees Becky waving to him while a bearded guy sits next to her, fidgeting with a straw and looking like he is trying his hardest to become invisible.

Dean grimaces before deciding that eating lunch with Becky is less pathetic than eating lunch alone. He brings his tray to her table and sits across from her.

“Heya, Becky,” he says, and her face lights up at hearing that Dean remembers her name.

“Hi, Dean. This is Chuck.” She gestures to the bearded man. “Do you remember Chuck?”

“Why wouldn’t he remember me?” Chuck asks before Dean can answer.

“Oh, Dean lost his memory. Just about all of it this time. Biggest relapse I’ve ever seen.”

“Becky! You shouldn’t tell me that. Patient confidentiality, remember? I’m sorry, Dean.”

“It’s cool,” Dean says. “I would have told you about as much. Nice to re-meet you, I guess.”

“You too.”

“So you don’t remember him,” Becky says.

“I remember you telling me about Chuck, if that’s what you mean. But no, I don’t remember meeting him.” He shifts his gaze to the man across from him, who has grown slightly pale and is wringing his hands. “Sorry.”

“No problem. Um, did you say Becky told you about me?”

Becky’s eyes widen, and Dean feels a pang of guilt. “Oh, uh, yeah. She told me you eat lunch with her a lot. And she was right. Here you are.”

“Oh,” Chuck says. “Well that’s fine I guess.”

Becky relaxes.

“So how do I know you, Chuck?” asks Dean, stuffing a sporkful of chili into his mouth and immediately wishing he hadn’t. “Or how did I anyway?”

“Um, we were roommates for a while. A few years ago.”

“What?” says Becky, looking back and forth between Dean and Chuck. “Why didn’t either of you ever tell me?”

“Because you didn’t ask and I didn’t think it was particularly important?” Chuck says.

“Don’t look at me,” says Dean. “I didn’t know until just now either.”

“You knew before your relapse,” Becky points out.

“Hey, I can’t be held responsible for stuff I don’t remember doing, now can I? For all intents and purposes, that was a different Dean.”

“You do seem to have changed quite a bit in the last two days,” Becky agrees.

“Really? How so?”

“Well, for starters, you’ve never voluntarily sat with me at lunch.”

“Who do I usually sit with?”

Becky and Chuck exchange some sort of look that Dean can’t decipher before Becky says, “No one.”

“Damn. I don’t have even one friend here?”

“I think the old you would say something to the effect of ‘I’m not the friend-making type,’” Chuck says, making his voice unnecessarily gruff at the end. “The only reason we’re not roommates anymore was that you finally convinced the higher-ups to let you have a room to yourself so you could be alone to brood.”

“Now who’s not respecting patient confidentiality?” Becky says.

“It’s different when _he’s_ the patient.”

“Nuh-uh. Dr. Fuller specifically said he didn’t want anyone to tell Dean anything about his life that he doesn’t already know. He thinks he should remember on his own.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“And how much stuff have you told him about himself since Dr. Fuller said that?”

That shuts Becky up.

Dean decides to give up on the chili and try the steamed carrots. They’re cold, but not too bad otherwise. When he looks up he realizes that Chuck hasn’t touched his plate since he sat down and is currently making writing motions with a straw as he stares down at the table in concentration.

“So, should I be worried about the food here or are you just not in the mood for brown sludge surprise?”

“Hm?” Chuck says, not bothering to look up at him for a moment. When he finally does, he looks startled. “Oh, sorry. No, I don’t think you have to worry about the food. I mean, it’s not going to win any awards for taste, but to my knowledge it has never made anyone sick. I’m, um, not hungry.” He fiddles with his straw for a moment before going back to his fake writing.

Dean thinks about asking him what he’s doing before deciding he doesn’t really want to know and going back to his carrots. Becky must notice the flash of curiosity on his face, because she volunteers: “Chuck does that when he wants to write but can’t.”

“Becky…”

“What? I didn’t tell him _why_  you can’t write.”

“Becky!” Chuck puts his head in his hands before slowly looking up at Dean. He sighs. “Before I came here, I was a writer. I had to stop because,” he looks around as if to check that no one is listening, and when he speaks again his voice is low, “because everything I wrote came true.”

“Listen, you really don’t need to tell me all this. I don’t mind not knowing.”

“No no, you know enough now that I might as well. I don’t want you to come to your own conclusions and end up thinking I’m some kind of nut. Anyway, I’m sure you can understand what a huge responsibility this was, having all of mankind bending to your will, subject to whatever changes you make just by writing them down. I had to quit my job, but to simply stop writing after so long doing so at every opportunity, well, it’s not easy. Even after I got rid of my computer and my typewriter, I still found myself scribbling stories on the edges of napkins at restaurants, only to find that my waitress had become a character in my story. So now I just fake it. It…calms me a bit.”

“How do you know you’re not just a psychic?” Dean asks.

Chuck scoffs. “Please, Dean. Even I’m not crazy enough to believe in those.” He glances at Dean and looks ashamed. “No offense.”

“Dean Winchester socializing with actual humans. I wouldn’t believe it if I wasn’t seeing it with my own eyes.”

“Meg!” Becky smiles at the nurse who has just walked up behind Dean. “What are you doing here? I thought your shift didn’t start for another hour.”

“Just couldn’t wait to see your hyperactive self, Blondie,” Meg smirks, taking the seat next to Dean. She’s cute, Dean notices, with long, brown hair and a pretty mouth, but her eyes ruin it. They’re dark, judgmental. The kind of eyes that could make a man pledge his devotion or pray for death, depending on what strikes her fancy.

“Really?” Becky says.

“Nah, Adam had to leave early and asked me to cover the rest of his shift. Something about a patient breaking his finger. Normally I’d tell him exactly where he could stick that finger, but he promised to be lookout every time I go out for a smoke for the next month. Poor bastard forgot we’re hardly ever here at the same time, but I’m holding him to it. Deal’s a deal, and I had to miss my soaps for this.” She turns to Dean abruptly. “I’m thoughtful like that. Name’s Nurse Masters, by the way. But you can call me Meg.”

“Nice to meet you, I guess,” Dean says, extending his hand. She ignores it.

“Oh, we’ve met,” she says, leering. “But I hear you don’t remember that. I’m the one who takes care of you at night.”

Dean is afraid to ask if that’s supposed to be a euphemism, but thankfully Becky pipes up before he can say anything.

“What Meg means to say is that she is your nurse from after lunch until nighttime.”

“How are you so sure that’s what I mean, Blondie?” Meg gives Dean a suggestive wink.

Becky opens and closes her mouth a few times as though unsure how to respond before settling on, “It’s Becky.”

The rest of lunch passes in silence, and afterwards Becky takes him to meet with Dr. Crowley MacLeod, who immediately kills his theory about the entire staff being on happy pills.

MacLeod is drinking what appears to be bourbon when Dean enters the room, and he is in no hurry to hide that fact. Instead, he raises his eyebrows and finishes his sip before setting the glass carefully on his desk and raising a finger to his lips.

“Dean Winchester,” he says. His voice is both calm and menacing, and he has an air of villainy that should be impossible for someone so short. Dean puts it down to the British accent. “I hear you’ve lost your mind again. You’d think after eight years you’d finally start to show some improvement, but leave it to you to relapse with no provocation whatsoever. Well done, really.”

“My memory,” Dean corrects, clenching his fists.

“I’m sorry?”

“I lost my memory, not my mind.”

“Yes, well. Stay here long enough, and you start to realize those things go hand in hand. Don’t get me wrong, you can certainly go insane without the help of memory loss. But forget the things you’ve done, the people you know, who you are, well. Let’s just say there aren’t too many who come out of that with all their marbles.”

“I might not remember much, but I’m perfectly aware of what’s going on.”

“Is that so? Because a little bird told me you’ve been seeing your trench-coated friend again.”

Dean curses Becky under his breath. “I thought I saw someone in my room last night. Whatever else Becky told you has been greatly exaggerated, okay?”

“Listen, Dean. As fascinating as your little hallucinations are—and they are fascinating—I really could not possibly care less whether you’re seeing ghosts or men or sparkly purple elephants. I didn’t call you here to talk about your feelings, though Sands seems to think that doing so and pretending that she cares will help her steal away my position as head doctor. Say what you will about me, but I’m always honest unless it’s inconvenient and I will tell you right now that I have no problem admitting that I. Don’t. Care. I don’t care if you regain your memory or overcome your delusions. You know what I do care about?”

“Enlighten me.”

MacLeod rolls his eyes. “I care about keeping this hospital open. I know you may not take me for the sentimental type, and you’d be right, but I’ve been working here for over twenty years, and I’ve grown comfortable here. Maybe it’s being around people whose brains are more messed up than mine, maybe it’s the fact that I get a doctor’s salary without having to worry about catching a deadly virus. I don’t know. But the fact remains that this hospital is already under the government’s watchful eye due to our rather liberal use of solitary confinement in the past.

“Now, I don’t have any qualms about locking you up by yourself if you misbehave; I did it once and I’ll do it again. But since President Schreiber is still trying to convince the country that he’s some sort of messiah, he’s cracking down on the use of solitary confinement. Says it qualifies as torture or something. And while I’d love to stick it to the Man, especially when the Man is so obviously a false-hope-manufacturing fraud like Marv Schreiber, I would not love to lose my job.

“I know Dr. Sands already talked to you about this, but frankly I don’t have the time or patience for her sweet and sour little threats. I’ve told you this before but seeing as you’ve lost your memory, I’ll remind you, and do try not to forget this time: don’t mess this up for me. You are this hospital’s second most difficult patient, and don’t think that I won’t put you out on the streets if you make one more big screw up. So do us both a favor, and please try to control yourself. Do we have an understanding?”

MacLeod’s speech must do as he intended, because Dean doesn’t punch him in the face or run away. Instead, he sits silently, clenching his fists until his nails dig into his palms hard enough to draw blood. After a few deep breaths, he says, “Yeah. We have an understanding.”

“Thought you’d see it my way,” the doctor says, picking up his bourbon and taking another sip. “Now scurry off. A nurse should be outside in a moment to collect you.”

*

Group therapy, surprisingly, proves to be the best part of the day. Not that that’s saying much; Dean still hates every minute, but at least it’s led by Dr. Fuller, who is the most competent (and least terrifying) doctor in the place as far as Dean is concerned.

“Who wants to start the discussion by telling us what goals they accomplished this week?”

Some of the patients in the large circle of chairs look at each other nervously; others stare at Dr. Fuller in defiance; still others don’t react at all, completely absorbed in their knitting or repeatedly counting their fingers or muttering to themselves.

Finally, one of the women—a smoking hot, petite girl who looks to be in her early twenties—rolls her eyes and raises her hand.

“Yes, Bela,” says Dr. Fuller. “What have you accomplished today?”

“I haven’t stolen a single thing all week. That’s a new record.”

“Very good, Bela. Everybody, clap for Bela.”

There’s a smattering of applause, in the middle of which a brunette girl scowls and leans towards the nervous-looking redhead sitting next to her, coughing as she says, “Liar.”

“Ruby?” Fuller says. “Do you have something you’d like to share?”

“Just that I organized my jewelry today. My favorite necklace has strangely gone missing though.” She glares at Bela who, Dean notices, has a silver chain around her neck that disappears into her shirt.

“Excellent work Ruby. And I hope you find your necklace. Let’s give Ruby a round of applause.”

It continues like that until nearly everyone who is willing and able to speak does. Anna, the red-haired girl sitting next to Ruby, plays with her fingers as she tells the group about the scarf she’s nearly done crocheting for her niece. Chuck announces that he came up with a great (but tragic) ending for the book he hasn’t been writing. A lanky man smiles from ear to ear as Mr. Fizzles, his sock puppet, tells the group that he painted a picture of a wolf that he’s pretty proud of. A woman named Jody says with pride that she managed to get out of bed by herself for the first time in a month.

Eventually, Dean feels like he has to either speak or come up with a good excuse as to why he can’t. He digs around in his head until he comes up with something. “I, uh, ate all my carrots.” He feels stupid as soon as the sentence leaves his mouth, so he covers it up with a cheeky grin. Fuller thanks him for sharing, and a few people clap. The knot in his stomach loosens a bit.

*

Castiel waits until Dean has been asleep for two hours before creeping towards his bed. He pulls a piece of paper out of his pocket and reads it over a few times before setting it on Dean’s chest, watching it rise and fall. Placing two fingers on the man’s head, he gives him a dream that will wake him up at seven, one hour before Becky comes in with breakfast.

He hopes it will be enough.


	3. Visitor

The sun is streaming brightly through the blinds when Dean awakes.

He was having a good dream—he vaguely recalls an open road and a pair of stormy blue eyes—but it was interrupted by a bright flash. He groans and rolls onto his stomach. Something crinkles beneath him.

“Huh?” he says, pulling the wrinkled sheet of notebook paper from between his chest and the mattress. It takes a few seconds for his eyes to adjust to the light before he can read it.

_Dean_ , it says in large, messy scrawl. _All is not as it seems. Get out as soon as possible._

There is no signature.

He tucks the note underneath his pillow and closes his eyes. All hopes of going back to sleep are dashed, but Becky will come in soon, so he decides he should at least try to act natural. Leaving—especially if something weird is going on like the note implies—isn't even an option.

He goes about his day the same as he did the one before. Becky brings his breakfast and he doesn't take his pill. He meets with Dr. Sands; she is as polite and as terrifying as he remembers. He doesn’t meet with Dr. MacLeod, though he does see him in the hall on his way to lunch, and the head doctor raises his eyebrows at him warningly. At group therapy, he tells Dr. Fuller that he started reading _Call of the Wild_ , though he didn't and doesn't plan to.

The note stays on his mind all day. He isn't sure what it means, and though he doesn't plan on taking its advice, he gets the feeling that it shouldn't be ignored. He wants to warn the people here, the kind ones and the angry ones and even Becky, to get away. The problem is that he doesn't know what they should be getting away from. He goes to bed that night wishing that the other Dean—the brave, imaginary one Becky tells him about—was real.

He is about to fall asleep when he hears footsteps, soft but quick, coming towards him. Before he can react, strong hands are gripping his shoulders and the man in the trench coat is staring down at him. His expression is somewhere between frantic and livid.

“Why didn't you leave like I told you to?”

“Uh,” says Dean.

“The note,” the man growls. “I know you found it. I saw you find it. Why do you never listen?” He searches Dean's face for an answer. Dean stares back, too shocked and confused to do anything else, and the man's expression softens. “After all this time, you still don't believe you deserve salvation.”

“Sa-Salvation?” Dean sputters. “No offense dude, but I haven't believed in that stuff for a long time.”

The man narrow his eyes, examining him, looking through him. “How would you know?”

Dean doesn't have an answer for that. “How'd you get in here anyway?” he asks instead.

“Not important,” he replies, pulling on Dean's shoulders until he is in a sitting position. “You need to go. Now.”

“Why?”

“Because you are in danger.” Though the man doesn't raise his voice, he bears a look of urgency.

“Yeah? What kind of danger?” Dean asks, swatting his hands away.

“Does it matter?”

“Yeah, it does. Not that I'm just going to take your word for it, but if the hospital is in danger, I'd like to know what the danger is before I leave everyone else here to die.”

“You'd risk your life to save these people? Even though you have only known them for a few days?”

Hearing it said out loud is a bit of a shock. Dean hadn't really considered his reason for not heeding the note's advice before. “Yeah, I guess so.”

The look of determination doesn't fade from the man's face, but Dean thinks he sees sadness creep into the ancient-looking eyes. “Sometimes I wish you would think of yourself before others.”

“And that's another thing,” Dean says. He can feel the anger bubbling beneath his skin, though he knows there is no reason for it. “Where do you get off acting like you know me better than I know myself? I mean, I know I've got this whole amnesia thing going on, but I think I know how I feel and what I believe a little better than some…” He stops, unsure what to call him. He puts his head in his hands and laughs. It's a bitter, hollow sound.

“Dean? Are you alright?”

“No,” he says, keeping his hands over his face as he lies back on his pillow. “I’m having a conversation with a guy who doesn't even exist. They told me I was crazy, and they were right.”

“You're not crazy,” the man replies. He pauses, tilts his head to the left. “And I do exist.”

“Okay.” Dean runs his hands down his face, letting out a shaky breath. “Let’s just pretend for a second that I believe you. Who are you?”

“Castiel.”

“ _What_ are you?”

The corner of Castiel’s mouth ticks up in an almost-smile. “At one time I would have told you I was an angel of the Lord.”

“An angel, huh?” At this point, he isn't even surprised. “And you aren't one anymore?”

“I suppose you could say I still am, though I'm not what I used to be.”

“So what are you now?”

“Cas,” he says matter-of-factly. “Now I'm just Cas.”

“Well, Cas the sort-of-angel, I don't know how much you actually know about me, but know this. I don't just run away from a place without a damn good reason for doing so. Especially when that place is in trouble.” As soon as the words leave his mouth, searing pain shoots through his skull. His vision blurs.

When it clears, he sees a tall, lanky boy standing in a doorway with a worn-out duffel bag slung over his shoulder.

_Sammy._

His father is there too, and both men are red-faced and screaming at each other. Dad yells that Sam should stay gone. Sam says that he intends to and slams the door shut behind him.

Dean remembers that day. He remembers wanting to chase his brother down, persuade him to come home, promise him that he would find a way to calm Dad down. And if that didn't work, he could always follow him to California. But that would mean starting a new life without hunting and without Dad, and though Dean never stayed in one place for long, the thought leaves him feeling homesick.

He doesn't notice that he is curled into a ball with his head down and knees pulled to his chest until he feels a cool hand on his back, not moving but pressing feather-light into his shoulder blade. The pain in his head subsides.

“Remembering what you have forgotten is causing you to have headaches,” Cas explains. “I can relieve the majority of the pain, though it's only a temporary solution. Every time you regain a true memory, the pain will return. I'm sorry.”

“S'okay. I mean, it sucks, but…wait, did you say 'true' memory? What does that even mean?”

“Dean,” Cas says, sitting down on the edge of the bed and staring at his hands. “This is not your world. Anything you remember about being here—about being a patient in this hospital—isn’t real. I thought you would have figured that out by now.”

“So what, you're saying my entire life is a lie? Is that it?”

“No, just part of it.”

“And this,” he waves his hand at the air around him. “The hospital and everyone in it—they aren't real?”

“They are, they just…oh, how do I explain this?”

“How about you start by telling me where the hell I am? Since this isn't the ‘real world.’”

“It's not that this world isn't real. There's no such thing as an imaginary world.” Cas speaks as though he is stating mundane facts, his voice and his expression completely even. He might as well be talking about the weather. “Every dream you've had, every book you've read—they're all real on some plane of existence. The small choices you and everyone else make each day create an infinite number of dimensions, some only slightly different from your own and others that you could not possibly comprehend. Even angels have a difficult time switching between dimensions. The fact that you seem to have ended up stuck in one where you don't belong is…impressive, though incredibly inconvenient.”

“Thank you?”

“Listen to me. You have to get out of here. You don't belong here. Staying in an alternate dimension could cause all sorts of problems for you. You have no idea how this world works. The laws of society and even the laws of physics that you have come to know may not apply here. It might seem like the world you know at first, only to find out later that waving hello is a crime punishable by death or that paper cuts are lethal. It's a miracle you haven't gotten yourself into any serious trouble already.”

“Becky waved to me the other day and no one shot her,” Dean points out. “Though Chuck did kind of look like he wanted to…”

“Dean.”

“Right, right, I get your point. But why should I believe you? As far as I know you're just some figment of my imagination.”

Castiel nods in agreement before glancing down, grabbing a fistful of Dean's hair, and giving it a sharp tug.

“Ow! What the hell, man?”

“Even in this universe, I don't think figments of your imagination can cause you pain.”

“Ugh, next time just pinch me or something, okay? I have a sensitive scalp.”

“Sorry,” Cas says, looking like he isn't particularly sorry at all.

“Okay,” Dean says, rubbing his head, “let’s just say—hypothetically, of course—that I buy this whole ‘alternate universe’ shtick. How do you propose that I get back to my world?”

Cas grimaces. “I haven't figured that part out yet.”

“Wait, so you don't even know how to leave this place, but you expect me to?”

“I was hoping, since you seem to have found your way here once, that you might be able to…” He meets Dean's gaze and sighs. “You're right. It was a stupid plan.”

Dean chuckles, and he's surprised by the sound. “Damn right it was. How did I end up here anyway?”

Castiel opens his mouth to respond but stops. His eyes go wide and he clamps his jaw shut.

“What?” Dean demands rather than asks. “What is it?”

“I…I don’t know.”

“Bullshit. You expect me to believe after that little display that you don't—”

“You misunderstand,” Cas says. “It's not that I haven't found out yet. I should know. I just…I can't remember.”

“You mean to tell me you _forgot_? Detail like that just slipped your mind.”

“It's not that simple.” Cas glares like he's trying very hard not to smite him. “I'm losing memories very rapidly these days.”

“An angel with dementia. And here I thought I'd heard everything.”

“I'm losing my grace,” he snaps, and Dean shuts up. Cas rubs a hand across his forehead and stares at the wall. “An angel's grace isn't just its source of power. My grace is my essence, similar to the relationship between a human and its soul. Without it, I'm not only powerless; I'm barely a shadow of my former self.”

“And this grace stuff,” Dean starts. “When it goes, it takes your memories with it?”

“Sometimes.” He turns to look at Dean, and once again Dean feels like he is being examined. “Every fall from grace is different. It happened to me once before, but then it was taken quickly and by force. I retained my memories, but I was basically human. Now I'm running on borrowed grace, and it's diminishing quickly. Every time I use my powers I burn more of it, but it would slowly fade away even if I did nothing.”

“Sounds like it's not much fun either way.”

“No,” Cas says, the corner of his mouth ticking up again. “No, it's not. Sometimes I think that it would be better to fall quickly and be reborn. No drawn out memory loss, no wishing I could be an angel again. Just a second of pain, and then I would be reborn as a human child. I could have a normal life, and I would grow up never knowing what I had lost. I could be happy, I think.”

“Angels can be reborn as babies? That's not what's going to happen to you when you lose your last memory, is it?”

“I don't think so. More than likely, I'll end up approximately like you were a few days ago. I'll wake up looking exactly the same, but I will have no idea who I am. I have only known of one angel to be reborn as a human, and she is long dead now.”

“Who’s that?”

“Anna.” Cas says her name like she was something precious. “She betrayed us all, but I miss her still.”

“Anna?” Dean says. “There was an angel named Anna?”

“Anael actually. But her human parents named her Anna, and that was what she preferred to be called. Why?”

“It's just, there's a patient here named Anna. It might not mean anything, but I heard someone say she hears angels in her head.”

Castiel's eyes grow wide. “What does she look like?”

“Uh, red hair, kinda thin, always looks nervous?”

“That's her. I mean, as an angel she was far from nervous, but I'm almost certain that's her. She was exhibiting the same symptoms shortly before she regained her grace. Where is she?” Cas is already at the door by the time Dean can get out of bed.

“Whoa, slow down there, Cas,” he says, putting a hand on the man's shoulder. “Didn't you just say that this world is different? The girl I see at group therapy might look like your Anna, but that doesn't mean she is.”

Castiel frowns. “You're right. Of course. I don't know what I was thinking.”

“It's fine. Look, if it means that much to you, maybe I could talk to her—”

“No,” he interrupts. “No, I'd rather you not.”

“Okay.” Dean puts his hands up in surrender. “Well what do we do now?”

“Wait, I suppose. Try to stay out of trouble while I search for a way out of here. You should get some sleep now.”

“So should you, man. You look exhausted.”

“I'm fine.”

“Yeah, well those circles under your eyes say otherwise.”

“The periorbital circles are a preexisting condition of my vessel.”

“Maybe, but the fact that you can barely keep your eyes open right now isn't. Seriously, go to sleep. You can even use the bed.”

“…Really?”

“Yeah, I don't mind taking the chair. Might get a funny look from Becky in the morning, but…”

“Oh,” Castiel says. Dean thinks he looks disappointed, but the look is gone before he can be sure. “If it's all the same to you, I would rather sleep in the chair.”

“You sure? The beds aren't half bad for being lined with plastic.”

“I would feel better if I could watch over you until you fall asleep.”

“Well that's…creepy. You do that often back in our world?”

“Much to your chagrin,” Cas smirks.

“Alright, just don't do anything…weird.”

Cas cocks his head to the side, and Dean laughs softly before climbing into bed. Cas lowers himself onto the flimsy wooden chair in the corner of the room shortly thereafter.

“Night, Cas,” Dean says as he buries his face in the pillow. He is fast asleep before Cas responds.

“Goodnight, Dean.”


	4. Tripping and Falling

Cas is still asleep in the chair when Becky comes in the next morning. Dean has a brief moment of panic and tries to think of a way to distract her while simultaneously waking Cas, but before he can think of a plan, he realizes that she if she were able to see Cas then she probably would have seen him already. If she does see him, she doesn't think much of it. She greets Dean as usual, gives him his tray of food, checks on how he's doing, tells him his meeting with Dr. Sands has been pushed back an hour, and is gone.

“Cas?” Dean says. The angel continues to snore softly. Dean gets out of bed and creeps toward him, stopping a little more than a foot away from the chair. “Castiel?” Still no response.

He feels the urge to touch him, just to know that he is real. Cas had touched him the night before, pulled his hair to prove his existence, but the pain is gone from Dean's scalp, and he is starting to feel doubt again. That's the excuse he makes when he reaches out to card his fingers through the dark, messy hair.

“Mm,” Cas hums as his eyes flutter open, and Dean snatches his hand back. “No, don’t stop. That felt nice.”

Part of Dean knows he should say no, that he was just doing it to wake Cas up and now he is done. But another, more treacherous part of himself can't help but notice that Cas's hair is really soft and that he wouldn't mind petting it all day. Against his better judgment, he replaces his hand and starts combing through the thick tresses. Cas closes his eyes.

“Cas?” he says after a moment.

“Hm?”

“How come Becky couldn't see you?”

Cas cracks his eyes open. “What?”

“Becky, the nurse. She came in a minute ago. I swear at one point she looked right at you and didn't even see you.”

“I didn't realize I slept so late. I should go back to searching for a passageway back to your dimension.”

“Cas…”

The angel sighs. “When I first arrived, I used my grace to make myself invisible to everyone. Now that you know I'm here, there's no reason to make myself invisible to you, but there's also no reason to make myself visible to anyone else.”

“Except that it's draining your powers faster, right?”

“Yes, except for that.”

“How's the memory, by the way? Still remember who you are and all that?”

“I am Castiel,” he drones, “and you are Dean.” Dean feels silently relieved that Cas remembers him too. “I seem to have forgotten two of the Ten Commandments. Or were there only eight?”

Dean gives Cas's cheek a light pat. “I think you'll survive.”

“I had no reason to think I wouldn't.” He stands and is suddenly nose to nose with Dean, staring in that way that makes Dean think he can see straight into his soul. Cas clears his throat, and Dean looks away first. “I should go.”

“Yeah,” Dean says. “Go, uh. Go find stuff.”

Cas nods before heading towards the window, which Dean now notices has a broken lock. A moment later, he is gone.

*

Dean wants to sit with Anna at lunch even though Castiel told him not to talk to her, but Becky is waving to him again, and he doesn't have the heart to say no. So he eats with her again, and she tells him way too much about the other patients while Chuck scribbles on the table with his straw.

“Hey Becky, can I ask you something?” he says when lunch is about to end. It's the first thing he has said since sitting down at the table.

Becky stops in the middle of her story about a patient who swears Tuesdays are a myth and looks up at him. “Yes, of course you can.”

“What exactly…I mean, do you know what I used to do? You know, before I came here.”

“Well, the other day, you seemed to remember something about hunting with your dad and your brother, but I think that was just the monster hunting thing again. Other than that, no.”

“That's kinda what I'm getting at. I mean, does anyone here know anything about my life before this place? How do they know for sure that I didn't hunt monsters or whatever?”

Becky and Chuck exchange a look. “Dean, have you been talking about this with Dr. Sands?” Becky asks.

“Is that your way of telling me I'm just crazy?”

“Of course not,” Becky assures in a too-sweet voice. “Don't get me wrong, I think it's great that you want to be a hero. And I like to believe that maybe you even were one, but like, I don't know, a fireman or something. But Dean…you know there's no such thing as monsters, right?”

The truth is, Dean doesn't know. He was pretty sure he knew, but after everything Cas told him the night before—after meeting Cas and never quite being able to shake the feeling that he was telling the truth—Dean doesn't know what might exist here or back in his world or anywhere in between. He doesn’t tell Becky that. “Yeah. Yeah, course I know. I was just…I don't know. Forget it.” He goes back to pushing his peas back and forth across his tray and doesn't say another word for the rest of lunch. Becky and Chuck's worried glances don't escape his attention, but he does his best to ignore them.

*

Castiel wishes he had some idea of where to look for the portal back to Dean's world. He can't travel very far without his wings, and he has already walked as far as his legs would take him in either direction down the road. He explored most of the hospital itself before finding Dean on his first day.

He decides to try going north along the dirt path that runs behind the hospital and into the woods. If nothing else, the forest seems like a nice place to walk and think, and he can use all the help he can get with thinking these days.

*

Dean isn't an idiot. He knows that the other patients talk about him, and he knows that what they have to say isn't flattering.

It isn't all of them, of course; some of them don't appear to speak at all, and most of the others mind their own business. But the few who do whisper to each other whenever he is near—Ruby, Bela, the slimy-looking guy named Gabe who likes to hide whoopee cushions in chairs in the cafeteria—have a way of getting under his skin no matter how much he wishes they didn't.

Apparently, his recent good behavior is both unexpected and suspicious, as he has a reputation for being the hospital's second-most-difficult patient (he still hasn't figured out who number one is). He is said to have a violent temper, and he's starting to understand why. If people keep talking about him like that, he might just break someone's nose.

As he makes his way back to his room after lunch, trying to tune out yet another whispered rumor about himself, he wonders how messed up you have to be before mental patients start calling you crazy.

He half-expects to see Cas waiting for him in his room when he gets back. When he doesn't, he takes it as a sign that maybe the angel hadn't been real after all. He had been pretty groggy that morning, and it wasn't unreasonable to think that a meeting that first occurred in the middle of the night might have been a dream. He decides that more sleep might be just what he needs, and he lies on top of the covers to take a nap.

The next thing he knows, Meg is waking him up to tell him that it's time for group therapy. He doesn't want to go, but he drags himself there just in time and ends up sitting between Jody and an older man in a trucker hat who nods at Dean in greeting when he sits down.

When Dr. Fuller asks Dean what he accomplished that day, Dean says that he hasn't done anything at all.

*

Cas returns just after dinner looking the worse for wear. There is dirt all along the front of his clothes and streaked across his face and dusted through his hair, and if Dean thought he looked tired before, it is nothing compared to the way he looks now. Despite his bloodshot eyes, however, his face is split by a toothy grin.

“I brought you this,” he says after he has shut the window behind him. He pulls a large, flat rock out of his jacket and holds it up to Dean proudly.

“Uh, thanks,” Dean says, taking the rock but keeping his eyes on Cas. “What happened to you?”

Cas looks down in surprise, as if he has just now noticed that he is covered in dirt. “Oh. I fell down. That's how I found the rock. Look, it looks like a coconut cream pie.”

Dean looks down at the rock in his hand and squints. It does not look like a pie.

“Yeah, sure does,” he says. Cas beams with pride. “Did you find whatever it is that'll get us out of here yet?”

“No, but I've been doing a lot of thinking.”

Dean waits. “And? What have you been think about?”

“Oh, lots of things. How to get back to your world, mostly. Also bees. Do you think they have bees in this world?”

“Did you hit your head when you fell?”

“No, no, I'm fine. No need to worry about me. You know, you worry too much, Dean. Always ‘ _people are in danger and it's my job to protect them_ ,’” he says, lowering his voice at the end. Which is ridiculous considering the fact that his voice is already lower than Dean's. “I used to be like that. But now, I don't worry about anything!”

“Cas, seriously, what did you do while you were gone?”

“Oh, nothing really. I went for a walk in the woods. I got kind of lost on my way back, but then this nice man—Oh, what was his name? Alex? Ashton?—anyway, he told me how to get back and gave me some of his healing herbs.”

“Healing what now?” It's then that Dean realizes that he has been so focused on Cas's filthy clothes and weird behavior that he completely neglected to notice the smell: marijuana. Cas reeks of it.

“Man, you smoked weed with some random guy in the woods?”

Cas squints, brow furrowing. “I suppose there could have been weeds mixed in with the herbs.”

Dean pinches the bridge of his nose. “Taking care of a stoned angel is not how I imagined spending my night.”

“Dean, like I said, I'm fine. Even if I was hurt when I fell, I could easily heal myself. No need for you to ‘take care of me,’” he says, using more air quotes than is strictly necessary.

“Let's just get you cleaned up, okay?”

“I can do that too. With my…what'd you used to call it…my ‘angel mojo.’”

“Shouldn't you be conserving your powers? You know, so you don't burn them all up before we can figure out how to get out of here?”

Cas frowns. “Oh. Right. Well, what should I do?”

“I'll walk you to the bathroom. You can shower there.”

That is how Dean finds himself standing outside of a shower stall, a dirt-covered trench coat and pantsuit bundled in his arms, praying that no one comes in. He's not sure how to explain this one, even (or especially) if Cas is still invisible to everyone but him.

Cas is humming some tune that Dean can't place (he's pretty sure Cas is off-key anyway), and he wonders if anyone else would be able to hear him. He also wonders whether or not they would even be able to see the clothes Dean is holding, but that leads to thoughts about clothing that is only sometimes visible, which leads to thoughts about Cas's clothes turning invisible while he is still wearing them. And since the guy is naked a few feet away with only a plastic curtain separating them, he decides this train of thought is starting to get inappropriate and quickly tries to think of something else.

'Something else' comes in the form of fast-approaching footsteps and a familiar voice muttering something about plot devices. Chuck. Without thinking his plan through, Dean ducks behind the curtain.

If Cas is surprised to see him there, he doesn't show it. He greets Dean with a lazy smile and continues to shampoo his hair. Dean nods, keeping his gaze firmly planted on Cas's face, before turning around to face the corner. His cheeks feel warm, and not just from the steam caused by the hot shower.

Cas finishes showering a minute later, much to Dean's relief. Cas's clothes are still dirty and he doesn't have any way of washing them, so Dean swipes Chuck's scrubs on his way out of the bathroom, making a mental note to pay Chuck back later.

He makes Cas take the bed and is about to settle himself into the chair when he feels a strong hand grip his arm.

“Don't go,” Cas says, eyes pleading. Dean waits for an explanation as to why Cas doesn't want him to leave. When none is offered, he shrugs and climbs into bed, facing the window and trying to maintain a respectful distance. The tiny bed makes it difficult to do so. Cas's shoulder is practically pressed into Dean's back, and when Cas takes a deep breath, Dean feels it.

Cas sighs happily beside him, and Dean feels that too. “I had a nice day. I wish it didn't have to end.” When Dean doesn't respond, he continues, sounding a bit sadder. “I don't like sleeping.”

“I'm sorry,” is all Dean can think to say.

“That's okay. Not your fault I'm turning human. Well,” he yawns, “maybe a little your fault. You are the one who led me to rebel in the first place. And if that hadn't happened, I wouldn't have gotten tangled up with Metatron, and my grace never would have been stolen, and I wouldn't have had to steal someone else's.”

A terrible silence follows, and Dean is almost certain that Cas has fallen asleep when he suddenly speaks again.

“Dean?”

“Yeah?”

“I just want you to know, no matter what happens, that all of this? Falling from grace, getting stuck in an alternate dimension, falling from grace again, dying over and over—and let me tell you, that last time was really unpleasant.” There's another pause. “But my point is…I just want to say…it was all worth it. It was worth it to get to know you.”

By the time Dean turns around to face him, Cas is asleep.


	5. With a Little Help from My Friends

Cas’s stomach is making noises when he wakes up. He cracks his eyes open and stares down at his abdomen accusingly, only to realize that he doesn’t know where he is. He is supposed to be sitting in a chair watching over Dean; that much he knows. Instead, he is curled up in a too-small bed, and there’s a weight on his left arm.

He is relieved when he looks over to see that the weight is Dean, who has rolled on top of Cas’s arm in his sleep. Dean is still asleep, so the nurse must not have come in yet. He pulls his arm away and is met with a numb, tingling sensation. Strange. He bends his wrist experimentally and feels pinpricks beneath his skin, but the feeling eventually begins to subside.

He isn’t sure what woke him, but he thinks it might have been a dream, or the end of one. Funny, he hasn’t had one of those since the last time he lost his grace. Dreams were one of the few things he enjoyed about being human, the only good thing about the nightly exhaustion-induced unconsciousness that was sleep. He might be excited to have them back if he didn’t realize the implications.

His stomach growls again. Another side effect of humanity.

Dean twitches in his sleep, muttering something almost unintelligible except for the word “no.” Cas puts his fingers to the man’s forehead to relieve him of whatever nightmare he is having, but he stops himself, stroking his hand gently through the short hair as Dean had done to him the morning before. The furrowed brow slowly relaxes.

The sun is just peeking over the trees outside the window, and Cas estimates that it will be about two hours before Becky shows up. Enough time to go back to sleep. As he curls in closer to Dean and closes his eyes, he thinks that being human might not be so bad after all.

If only he could keep this memory forever.

*

“I’m coming with you.”

Cas takes his hands off the window frame and turns around. “What?”

“I’m tired of sitting around doing nothing,” Dean says, pulling on his white hospital shoes. “I want to help you find a way out of here.”

“You have your meeting with Dr. Sands soon.”

“I think we kinda have bigger fish to fry right now. Don’t you?”

Cas squints. “Dr. Sands is a fish? What a peculiar universe.”

Dean can’t help it. He laughs, throwing his head back and letting out a hoot loud enough that it’s sure to call some attention. For the first time, Dean is grateful to be in a mental hospital. He wouldn’t be the first person there to be caught laughing at nothing.

But even as he wipes the mirthful tears from his eyes, he can’t shake the feeling that he’s been getting around Cas more and more often: that something about him is achingly familiar. The way he tilts his head and squints when he’s confused, the deep grumble of his voice that can sound so commanding at times and so soft at others, the unmistakable sadness behind his eyes even when he smiles. He’s fairly certain he’s never met another person quite like him, yet he feels so much more at ease around the man than he feels around anyone else in the hospital. Again, he wonders just how close he and Cas were in this other world.

He doesn’t mention any of this to Cas. “What I mean,” he says, “is that getting out of this place is more important than meeting with my therapist.”

“Will you still feel that way when they discover that you’re gone? When you come back and they throw you in solitary confinement?”

“That’s what I mean, man! We don’t have to come back. The portal could be _anywhere_. You can only travel so far in one day, so why don’t we just keep going? If we’re together, you won’t have to come back to check up on me every night.”

Cas’s expression darkens. “You think I come here for you?”

There is the commanding tone that makes him shiver. He tries his best not to let Cas know how it affects him. “Yeah, kinda.”

“Well I don’t.” Something in his tone tells Dean he is lying.

“Okay, then what do you come here for?”

“I’m becoming more human every day. I need a comfortable place to sleep.”

“Up until last night, you slept in a chair.”

“It’s indoors and therefore protects me from the elements while I sleep.”

“You still have some angel juice left. Can’t you just control the weather for a little while?”

“That would drain my powers faster than necessary.”

“Kind of like what you’re doing when you make yourself invisible to everyone but me?”

Cas huffs a breath through his nose. “Shut up.”

“Ha! Gotcha. Now what’s the real reason?”

“Dean—”

“Tell me or I climb out that window right now and look for this portal thing with or without you.”

“You can’t leave the hospital.”

Dean raises an eyebrow.

Cas sighs. “Fine, I don’t _want_ you to leave the hospital.”

“Why not?”

“I still don’t know a great deal about this world, Dean. I don’t know what dangers we might run into if we stray too far, and while I am fairly confident that I can protect myself from almost anything, I can’t ensure the same safety for you. But you’ve survived this long in the hospital and, despite its management problems, it seems to be a safe enough place for you to stay. So I don’t think you should leave until either it is proven to be unsafe or I find the exit.”

“That still doesn’t explain why you keep coming back.”

“Yes, well.” If Dean didn’t know any better, he would say Cas is blushing. “I really should be going.” He doesn’t move.

“I think,” Dean says, creeping closer, a wicked smile playing across his lips, “that you just like to see me.” He stops mere inches from Cas’s face, and it isn’t until he realizes Cas is leaning in too that he backs away.

“Cas…” _What were we to each other?_ The question is on the tip of his tongue again, but he can’t make himself ask out loud. “I really do want to help,” he says instead. “Please, just tell me what I can do.”

Cas glances from one side of the room to the other and back again, as if the answer might be hiding in a corner or under the bed. “I suppose it wouldn’t hurt for you to do some research. The hospital has a library, yes?” Dean nods. “See if you can find out what differences there are between this world and your own. That may give us some clue as to how to get out.”

“Research. I can do that.”

“Good. Now hurry, or you’ll be late for your appointment.” He pats Dean’s cheek before climbing out the window. Somehow, Dean thinks, he looks smaller than usual.

*

There are no friendly men offering Cas any kind of herbs on his journey today, and he doesn’t know whether to be grateful or disappointed. Being alone with his unaltered thoughts is helpful to his problem-solving skills but potentially harmful in other ways.

He isn’t sure what happened (or what almost happened) between Dean and himself before he left that morning, but he can’t shake the disappointment that lingers long after the blisters on his feet reopen and new ones form.

He wonders what would have happened if he had reacted more quickly or perhaps hadn’t reacted at all. He remembers the look of alarm on Dean’s face, and he remembers seeing the look before when Cas announced that he’d had sex with a reaper. He remembers the pleading look Dean gave him as he begged Cas to let him help, too similar to the bloodied and broken Dean of long ago who fell to his knees in a crypt told Cas that he needed him.

And that’s a problem all on its own. The memories, the vivid detail with which he remembers every moment with Dean, from pulling him out of hell to discovering the horrible truth about what his righteous man had become. He knows that these memories aren’t helpful, yet he clings to every memory of Dean that he has, both good ones and bad ones, because he can’t think of anything else he wants so badly not to forget.

But Dean doesn’t remember him, and that’s what hurts most of all. He can deal with his own shortcomings, but having Dean so near without being able to remember all that they have been through, even if he does accept Cas’s words as truth…well. Cas thinks that he finally understands why Dean looked so broken when he spoke to Emmanuel.

This Dean, he reminds himself again, is not his Dean. He may be from the correct world, but he is more similar to Dean years before he met Cas: still injured and self-deprecating but untainted by the pain of hell. And Cas should be happy about that. He knows he should. But he misses his own Dean terribly.

That’s when it hits him. This Dean—the Dean waiting for him back at the hospital— _is_ his Dean. He may not have his memories, but he is the correct Dean from the correct dimension. The one that Cas has known for years. Which means…

Which means that the Dean that all the people in the hospital remember isn’t the same one. The Dean that belongs in this world is missing.

*

The library is nothing more than two wire racks sitting on a table in the corner of the rec center, but Dean manages to find an only-slightly-outdated history textbook, a book of myths and legends with its front cover missing, and a copy of _Cat’s Cradle_ that isn’t strictly necessary for research but looks so well-loved that Dean can’t help himself.

It is the first free time he’s had that he has spent outside of his room, and the stares he receives as he collects his books would be annoying if they weren’t so disconcerting. He isn’t sure why everyone seems to think he’s so unfriendly, but he is resolved to change it.

He starts flipping through _Myths and Legends_ in one of the rec room’s armchairs. After a while, Jody comes over to sit next to him, offering him a smile that is tentative but kind. He does his best to give her a friendly smile in return before going back to his reading.

It isn’t long before rec time is over. On his way to group therapy, he runs into Meg and asks her if he can eat dinner in the cafeteria with everyone else.

“I don’t get you, Winchester,” she says, shaking her head. “You act like you’re too good to be around anyone else for eight years, throw hissy fit after hissy fit until you get your own room and are allowed to eat all but one meal alone in it, then just in the last few days you turn into Mr. Social. What are you playing at?”

“Guess I’ve just turned over a new leaf is all,” he replies.

Meg raises her eyebrow, but she walks with him to the cafeteria when group therapy is over.

Becky’s shift is over now, so Dean stands at the front of the cafeteria for a moment like he did on the first day, trying to figure out where to sit. Once again, he considers sitting with Anna, who is sitting alone, as usual. Before he can, however, he feels a hand lightly touch his elbow. He looks down to find Jody staring back at him. “We have some extra seats at our table, if you’re looking for somewhere to sit,” she says. And how can Dean say no?

In addition to Jody, “we” turns out to be the man with the trucker hat Dean sat next to in group therapy the day before, a petite blonde he saw tackle a 200 pound man to the ground when he cut in front of her in the lunch line on pizza day, an Asian kid who looks like he hasn’t slept in about a week, and a man in a newsy cap who greets Dean with, “Hey, Brother.”

“Name’s Benny,” the man says. “I reckon you don’t remember now, but you helped me out once when MacLeod was threatening to send me to solitary. Took the blame for something you didn’t even do. You’re always welcome at this table, Brother.”

“Thanks,” Dean says.

“I’m Jo,” the blonde girl grins mischievously. “You hit on me once and I punched you in the face.”

“Uh.”

“Jo, play nice,” Jody scolds. She turns to the older guy. “And this big lug over here is Bobby.” The man grunts but gives Dean a nod of acknowledgement. “He doesn’t say much, and he might seem kind of intimidating at first, but he’s really just an old softy. Right Bobby?”

Bobby grunts again, though his ears have turned pink.

“Nice to meet you all. And what about you, kid?” Dean says, turning to the Asian boy who nearly drops his spork on the ground.

“M-my name is Kevin,” he says. “You’re not going to go ballistic and try to kill me, are you?”

“Kevin, what did I say about listening to rumors?” says Jody. She turns back to Dean. “He’s new.”

“Ah,” Dean says. “Well in that case, I’m Dean Winchester. I enjoy sunsets, long walks on the beach, and hunting monsters, and I can’t remember my own middle name.” He extends his hand. “Nice to meet you.”

Kevin looks surprised at first. Then his face splits into a wide grin and he starts laughing, high-pitched and loud, which looks like it surprises him even more. When he finally composes himself, he takes Dean’s hand and says, “I think—no I _know—_ that’s the first time I’ve laughed in the week that I’ve been here. Thank you.”

Dean doesn’t quite know how to react to the sudden display of kindness these people have shown him, so he rubs the back of his neck and tries to return their smiles. “No problem, man.”


	6. Melding Minds

“Whoa, Cas! You gotta calm down, man. You’re freaking me out.”

Cas instantly goes from frantic to sheepish and removes his hands from Dean’s temples. “Apologies.”

“It’s okay, just warn me next time you decide to attack my head.”

Cas looks like he wants to protest that he never attacked anyone, but then he thinks better of it. “Okay,” he says.

“Now what were you saying about a way to get back? Did you find a portal or something?”

“No. But something occurred to me while I was searching. I think I was coming to the same conclusion yesterday when I became…distracted.”

“Is that what they call it these days?”

Cas glares at him. “Anyway, I was thinking about how everyone here knows you and thinks you've been a patient for years. I can’t remember how long you have actually been here, but I don’t think it has been as long as everyone says.”

“Okay…?”

“That, in combination with the fact that the unfriendly tendencies you have been described as having by the staff and fellow patients contrast with what I have come to know about you, can only mean one thing.”

Dean shrugs.

Cas sighs. “It means that there was an alternate version of yourself. Here. In this hospital. And, for some reason, he’s no longer here.”

"How do you know for sure that I'm not him?"

Cas lifts his chin in a gesture that is probably supposed to be righteous indignation, but he can't hide the fond half-smile playing at his lips. "I'm an angel, you ass. I know your soul when I see it."

Though Dean already suspected that Cas could see more than just his exterior when he looked at him, the statement sends a chill up his spine. “Fair enough. But what does that have to do with us getting out of here?”

“Dean, all this time, I’ve been looking for a physical portal, searching the land and coming up empty-handed. But what if it isn't physical?”

“You lost me.”

“What I mean to say is, what if it’s a _mental_ gateway that led you here? Some sort of psychic connection between you and the Dean who actually belongs in this world?”

“A mental gateway to a mental hospital. Huh.” The irony is not lost on Dean, though Cas doesn’t give any indication that he gets it. “But wait, if I’m here, then where’s the doppelgänger?”

“Good question. That’s what I was hoping to find out.” He raises his hands to either side of Dean’s head, hovering a few inches away from his temples. “May I?”

Dean licks his lips nervously. “What are you gonna do?”

“I believe the version of you that belongs here is back in your universe. If so, the portal may still be open. If I could go into your mind, just for a little while, I might be able to find it.”

“Angels can do that?”

“At full power, we can achieve much greater things. But yes, angels can do that.”

“Will it hurt?”

“There’s a chance that sorting through your brain may loosen some of the memories you have repressed, triggering a headache like the ones you have already experienced. Maybe worse, if you remember multiple things at once.”

“In other words, it’s going to hurt like a bitch.”

“Probably.”

Dean hesitates, then nods. “Okay.”

Cas lays his hands gently on either side of Dean’s head. “You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to,” he offers.

“Yeah, I do.”

Cas looks up. His eyes say _I’m sorry._

There’s a sound like insects, buzzing higher and louder until it rings in Dean’s ears. His mouth tastes like copper. There’s a flash so bright that Dean can’t decide whether it is white or blue.

Everything goes dark.

When his eyes adjust, Dean realizes that he is standing in what appears to be a dimly lit cave. A smell like dust and dirty water hangs in the air, and he can’t find an exit from which the small amount of light might be coming.

“Where am I?”

“Technically speaking, you’re in a mental hospital in Ketchum, Oklahoma,” a voice behind him says. He turns to find Cas standing behind him in his trench coat rather than the white scrubs he had been wearing a minute ago. “Less technically, you’re inside your own mind.”

“And you? You’re in my mind too?”

“Not really. In fact, you aren’t really here either. Here isn’t even here. What you see is more of a quasi-physical manifestation of my mind joining with yours.”

Dean shakes his head, or what he thinks of as his head. “Now I know how Kirk must have felt.”

“Come on,” Cas says, heading for a door-sized opening in the cave wall that Dean didn’t see before. “I don’t know how much longer I’ll be able to hold the connection.”

Dean follows him through the cave, which eventually grows lighter and more structured until they are standing in what appears to be the hospital cafeteria. Dean sees himself sitting at a table with Jody and her friends, laughing and joking with Kevin Tran.

“This memory is recent,” Cas says. “We have a long way to go.”

“What exactly are we looking for anyway?”

“A way out.”

“Yeah, I got that. But how will we know it when we find it? What does it look like?”

“I’m not sure.”

“Oh. Well that’s reassuring.”

The first time they run across a memory that isn’t about the hospital, Dean feels a dull throbbing in his skull. When he sees Cas slumped over in a chair, blood pouring from his abdomen, the throbbing gets worse and is accompanied by a sinking feeling in his gut.

 _“Cas!”_ he hears some other version of himself shout, rushing to the man and cupping the sides of his face with his hands. _“Cas Cas Cas,”_ he repeats. He sounds desperate.

He sees a tall man ( _Sammy,_ he thinks;  _h_ _e looks so much older_ ) approach Cas and place his hand over the wound in his stomach. A bright light like the one Dean saw when Cas did his mind meld appears, and Cas opens his eyes.

“Let’s go,” his own Cas says.

“Cas!” Dean calls after him as they enter an empty room that makes Dean think _bunker_ and then _home._ “You _died._ ”

“Yes,” Cas says. “But it was only for a minute or so that time.”

“That time? You’ve died more than once? What am I saying? You’re an angel. Probably just another one of your freaky angel things, right?”

“No, actually. It seems to be more of a Winchester-brothers-and-everyone-around-them thing. You’ve died more times than I have.”

“Wait, what? How many times? Cas!”

Cas ignores him.

They walk through a few more rooms. Dean sees himself fighting demons and vampires, fighting with Sam, making up with Sam. He sees a kid who looks unnervingly like Kevin Tran lying dead on the floor with his eyes burned out. He sees a deep forest full of monsters and one very dirty angel. He sees Bobby die. He sees Cas die again, blown to bits by someone who looks like his brother but is apparently Satan. He sees himself die again and again and again.

“How much longer is this going to take?” Dean asks, rubbing his temples. The headaches are growing worse with every room that they walk through. The memories aren’t even in the right order most of the time, so he doesn’t get the satisfaction of understanding his own life as a reward. The scenes are all scrambled up and most of them feel like they happened to a stranger. If anything, he’s more confused than ever.

“I don’t know,” Cas says. “I may have overestimated the ease with which we would be able to find clues. Your mind is a bit chaotic.”

“Well sorry, but that’s kinda out of my control.”

“I wasn’t blaming you.”

“Sure sounded like you were,” Dean grumbles.

More and more rooms, and then they find a memory Dean wishes he could forget.

_“You want it? Take it! But you’re gonna have to kill me first.”_

They are in a crypt of some sort, and Dean is on his knees, bloodied and broken before an emotionless Castiel. A stone tablet lies on the floor, and in between the pulses of stabbing pain in his head, Dean remembers _angel tablet._

 _“Come on, you coward, do it!”_ he hears himself scream. _“Do it!”_

Castiel’s only response is to hit him. And then he hits him again, and again, and again. Something about the entire scene is surreal, like a dream. After a while, he isn’t sure which Dean is himself and which is the memory anymore. He’s vaguely aware that he is begging and pleading now, saying Cas’s name over and over, while the angel remains cold and unaffected. Blood is roaring in his ears so loudly that he cannot hear.

Just when he thinks he’s going to pass out, he finds himself lying on the cold, tile floor of the hospital.

He looks up to find a pair of blue eyes staring down at him. Cas is crouching over him, checking his pulse, and Dean pushes him away. The angel doesn’t try to resist, stumbling backwards into the wall.

Dean stands on unsteady legs to approach him. When he is about a foot away, he punches him in the jaw. Cas doesn't fight back.

“Who are you?” Dean demands.

“I’m Cas,” he says, “and I am your friend.”

“Bullshit. Who are you really?”

“Dean, I know what you saw back there looked bad, but I think you should know—”

“You know, when you said I died a bunch of times, it freaked me out. But I didn’t think you’d be one of the ones to kill me.”

“I did not kill you.”

“Tried to.”

“It wasn’t what it looked like.”

“Oh really, Cas? It wasn’t you beating me to a pulp and ready to kill me over…what even was that thing? A rock? Or were you possessed by the devil too?”

“I suppose, strictly speaking, it was what it looked like. But you have to understand—”

“No, I don’t. I-I don’t think I _can_ understand. Everything is more confusing than ever and I just…I’ve only known you for a few days. I don’t know why I decided to trust you.” He shakes his head. It still aches. “But I’m done now. I’m done with whatever this is.”

“Please, just listen to me. What you saw was me at my very worst. I was wrong and misguided, and I’m sorry. But Dean, I would never hurt you like that on purpose. Not again. Not now.”

“Yeah? Then why’d you take me there in the first place?”

No response.

“Get out.”

Cas’s eyes grow wide. “Dean—”

“I said, get out!” Dean screams.

Stormy eyes stare back at him, sadder than ever, and Cas nods. The falling angel opens the window and climbs out. He doesn't look back.

As he watches Cas leave, Dean thinks he hears a whispered “I’m sorry, Dean.”


	7. Life Goes On, Sort Of

The night Castiel leaves, Dean doesn’t sleep. He stares at the ceiling for hours, first angry, then confused, then sad, then numb. When Becky comes in the next morning, he can’t make himself eat his breakfast.

Cas doesn’t return that night, or the next night, or the next. Dean stops going to the rec center and to dinner, choosing to spend every free minute in his room waiting for Cas to come back. Every day, he sits on his bed and stares at the small window across from him, barely seeing the trees and the streetlights and the sky outside. Every day, it doesn’t open.

After four days, he wanders into the cafeteria at dinnertime. He doesn’t know why he ended up there, just that he suddenly needed to get out of his room and that is where his feet led him. He asks Jody if he can eat at her table again. She smiles and pulls out a chair.

After a week, he catches himself smiling at Jo, and after two weeks he laughs at a joke that Benny tells him. Healing is going to be a slow process, he knows, but he can feel himself getting better every day.

He hasn’t regained any more memories since the one in the crypt, and for that he is grateful. Life at the hospital is far from perfect, but without Cas and the memories of some fantastical monster-hunting life, it’s finally starting to feel normal. He tells himself that the angel Castiel was never real in the first place, and after a while he starts to believe it.

Things are looking up, but even on the best days, Dean can’t shake the feeling that something is wrong. It nags at the back of his mind every night, and there are days when he wakes up feeling so wrong that Becky has to help him get out of bed.

Most of the time, though, Dean is happy. He gradually becomes more social, and he even makes friends. The people at his dinner table become his family. He looks out for Kevin and Jo like little siblings, forms a brotherly bond with Benny, gets mothered by Jody, and—after learning to communicate with him in a sort of improvised sign language—finds a father figure in Bobby. He even gets a third parent: Jo’s mother, Ellen, who comes to visit almost daily and has taken to bringing Dean pie.

He takes up chess during rec hours, which is where he meets Charlie, a new patient at the hospital. She seems scared of everyone and everything at first, and she looks distrustful when Dean invites her to play chess with him for the first time. But by the end of the game (which doesn’t take long, as Charlie is apparently a chess master), she is laughing while Dean challenges her to a rematch. She beats him again, of course.

He grows so accustomed to their daily two o’clock chess matches that when she doesn’t show up one day, he immediately becomes worried.

He knows there’s no real reason to be nervous. She could just be napping or in a meeting. Maybe she even got to go home. Sure Charlie has only been at the hospital for three weeks, but people often stay even shorter than that. And he should be used to his friends leaving. Benny got out just the week before and it was no big deal. Dean was even happy for him.

Maybe it’s because, in the short time that he’s known her, Charlie has become his closest friend at the hospital and the first person he has really trusted since Cas. She tells him about the depression she experienced following her parents’ deaths, and Dean tells her about his jumbled memories and his probably-imaginary friend. They whisper secrets and sympathize with each other while they battle knights against bishops and queens against kings, and Dean soon invites her to eat dinner with him, introducing her to the rest of the table as “the little sister I never wanted.” Dean knows it’s selfish, but he really hopes she isn’t gone.

It just seems like Charlie would have told him she was leaving or waited to say goodbye.

When she doesn’t show up to group therapy or dinner, Dean knows that either she is gone or something much worse has happened. That night, he asks Meg if she knows what happened to her, and when she won’t tell him, he asks Becky. Becky shrugs and says she wishes she knew. Charlie was always willing to listen to her stories, and she even remembered her name.

He asks the other patients, and those that remember her don’t know what happened to her either. He’s getting truly worried about her when Kevin stops showing up one day too.

The trend continues. Jody disappears, then Jo, and finally Bobby. His dinner table, which was full of laughter and life just a few weeks before, is now empty and depressing. Dinnertime becomes his least favorite part of the day, and he eventually asks Meg if he can eat alone in his room again.

By now, he is certain that his friends haven’t all just checked out of the hospital without warning. Something strange is going on, and he becomes obsessed with finding out what it is. He questions every nurse and patient he can find and, when none of them can help him, gets desperate and asks the doctors. Sands smiles her too-wide smile and lectures him on patient confidentiality. Fuller interrupts him to say that he is busy and to ask Nurse Rosenberg if he has any questions or concerns. McLeod just scoffs.

It has been over two months since he last saw Cas when he sits on the end of his bed, bows his head, and prays. He’s still not sure that angels actually exist, and he’s even less sure that they would listen to the prayers of a guy in a mental hospital if they did, but it seems like the right thing to do. Besides, Dean is running out of options.

He prays every night, but his prayers are never answered.

Another week goes by before he runs across the rock hidden beneath a loose floorboard. Cas must have hidden it there. It still doesn’t look like a pie, but it is proof that Cas was real. Which reminds him…

He reaches back into the hole in the floor and pulls out a heavy, dirty piece of cloth that he recognizes as Cas’s trench coat. He turns it over in his hands, gently wiping away some of the caked-on dirt.

Something about the coat never seemed quite right to him. It’s too short, not the right shade of tan. As he stares at it, he realizes why that is.

Pain shoots through his head in a way that it hasn’t in months, and he falls to his knees. In his mind, he sees Cas walking into a lake and disappearing for what he thought would be forever. He sees himself pick up the trench coat when it floats back to shore, clean it and fold it and keep it in the back of his car, take it out sometimes when he wakes up in the middle of the night after dreaming about his friend’s death. He sees Castiel come back as a stranger named Emmanuel, sees the disappointment in his own eyes and the happiness when Cas finally remembers.

What’s more, he can _feel_ those emotions as if the scene is happening to him right then and there.

“Castiel!” he croaks when his head stops hurting enough to let him talk. “I need you, man. Please come back.” He blinks, and the afterimage of Cas disappearing into the lake flashes across his vision. “I need you.”

He falls asleep on the floor still clutching the trench coat. Cas doesn’t come.

The next day, he decides to talk to Anna. To say she looks surprised when he sets his dinner tray down across from her and flashes his most charming grin would be an understatement.

“Um. Hello,” she says.

“Hi,” Dean says. “Mind if I sit here?”

She shakes her head. “I mean ‘no I don’t mind,’ not ‘no don’t sit there,’” she clarifies, blushing.

“Thanks,” he says, taking his seat. “Listen, I was wondering if I could ask you something.”

“O-okay.”

“So I, uh, I hear you can talk to angels.”

Her expression darkens, all signs of shyness gone. “Look, if you just came over here to make fun of me—”

“What? No! I wasn’t trying to make fun of you. That’s the last thing I want to do, believe me.”

“Oh.” That seems to appease her a little, but she still looks skeptical. “Then what do you want?”

“I…look, this might sound crazy…but I was wondering…um. Wow this is difficult.”

“Dean,” Anna whispers, and that takes him by surprise, because he wasn’t even sure Anna knew his name. “I hear angels talking in my head. Nothing you can say is going to sound crazy to me.” She gives him a small smile. Between her red hair and her kind eyes, he can’t help but think of Charlie. His chest aches.

“Yeah?”

She nods. “I won’t even laugh at you. Mental patient’s honor.”

“Yeah. Yeah, okay. It’s just, I think I might have—completely unintentionally—befriended an angel.”

Anna’s eyes widen a little, but true to her word, she doesn’t laugh or call him crazy. “Really?” she says. “How?”

“He uh…he kind of showed up in my room one night and kept coming back.”

“How long has this been going on?” By now he can tell that Anna is interested.

“Well, I first met him nearly three months ago…but I haven’t seen him in a while.”

“How come? Did he say he was going somewhere or did he just stop showing up one day?”

“Neither, really. It’s…complicated.”

Anna nods as though she understands. It strikes him that she has not once suggested that this was all in his head, and for that he is grateful.

“I kind of said some things to him that I shouldn’t have. This angel, or whatever he was…apparently we have some history. Some of it’s not so good. And when I found out something about him that I really wish I hadn’t, I sort of freaked out and told him to leave. I haven’t seen him since.”

“And how long ago was that?”

“Two and a half months, give or take.”

“Wow, so you really didn’t know him for very long.”

“But that’s just it. I think I did. From the very first time I met him, even before he told me he knew me, I just…I _knew,_ okay? Everything about him was so familiar, and I knew there was no way we’d never met before. I’ve made friends in this hospital—real, honest-to-god friends—but I never felt that close with anyone, even after knowing them for weeks. The closest friend I made besides him,” the words catch in his throat, and he can’t help but glance towards his old table at Charlie’s empty seat, “well, she’s gone now.”

“It looks like she’s not the only one.”

Dean nods. “I know. That’s part of what all this is about. Anna, I think something weird is going on around here. Something unnatural. I don’t know who else to turn to.”

“Is that the only reason you want to get in touch with this angel again? So he can help you find your friends?”

Dean bows his head. “No. No, it’s not.”

“Then I’ll help.”

Dean’s head shoots up. “What? Really?”

“Well I’m not going to risk summoning an angel just so you can use it as a tool. Angels are beautiful, glorious creatures, but they’re also very powerful and easily pissed-off. I’m in no mood to die.”

“Fair enough.”

“But if this angel really is your friend and you want to see him again, then I’ll help you.”

“Wow. Thank you, Anna. I don’t know how to repay you for this.”

She smirks. “Sit with me at dinner more often and we’ll call it even.”

And there it is: the floaty feeling in his stomach that Dean feels whenever he meets someone he likes. He pushes it down even as he returns her smile. Bad things seem to be happening to people he likes recently. He can’t afford to lose another friend.

“Deal,” he says anyway. “So tell me, Anna, have you ever heard of an angel named Castiel?”


	8. Hello Again

The Biggerson’s bathroom smells like cigarettes and urine, and Castiel can’t find it in himself to care. At least this one has clear running water and a vomit-free floor. He pulls his toothbrush and travel-sized toothpaste out of the pocket of the jeans he stole from a clothesline, and he thanks whoever is listening that the bathroom is empty this time.

He has come a long way since he first tried brushing his teeth, back when he lost his grace the first time. He now knows how to put the toothpaste on the brush and rinse it off before using it, and he is meticulous about brushing every single tooth as well as his gums. It has become a form of relaxation for him. He likes that he can do this one small thing to take care of himself every day, and he likes how fast it can make him feel a little cleaner, a little better.

Still, he doesn’t care for the odd looks he gets when he tries to do it in front of people.

He finishes brushing his teeth and splashes water over his face. The bathroom is out of paper towels, so he has to settle for drying his face on the sleeve of his sweater. He thinks back to the gym he found the other day, the one with showers and warm water. Perhaps he should have stayed there.

Back inside Biggerson’s, his routine is the same as always. Sit close enough to the registers that he can listen in on orders, memorize the numbers, wait for someone who looks like they aren’t paying attention, grab their food as subtly as possible when their number is called, and hightail it out of the restaurant. It works most of the time.

Today he ends up with a cheeseburger and onion rings, courtesy of a woman who had been yelling something about a divorce into her cell phone. He doesn’t think he likes onion rings, but he is too hungry to be picky. He finds an empty bench two blocks away from the restaurant and settles down to eat.

The food is greasy, but it takes the edge off his hunger and warms him up a bit. Winter appears to be coming early this year, and the cardigan that a man on the street gave him when the first cold snap caused him to shiver in his thin shirt has long since been enough to keep him warm at night. He doesn’t know how long he’ll last after the first snow.

When he’s done, he wipes his greasy hands on the paper bag and pulls a small notebook and a pen out of the back pocket of his jeans. He flips to a clean page and writes:

_Oct 23—Boise, Idaho_

  * _Finds: none_
  * _Onion rings are disgusting_
  * _It has been 73 days since I last saw Dean_



He puts his pen and notebook away and looks up. The sky is growing dark, and he is wondering whether the bench he’s sitting on is in a safe enough neighborhood for him to sleep there when he feels a tug in his gut. He wonders if the onion rings are to blame. Then he realizes that he has felt this before. He can’t remember when or why, but the niggling feeling at the back of his mind sends him into a panic.

Before he knows what’s happening, he finds himself in a small, white room, face-to-face with a red-haired girl. She looks like someone he should know, if only he could remember. He whips his head around frantically, and his eyes land on an even more familiar face. This time, he knows exactly whom he is looking at.

“Dean,” he breathes.

The man steps forward, smiling gently. His eyes are sad but hopeful. “Hey, Cas.”

*

Cas materializes in the room looking more human than ever. He is still wearing the white scrub top that Dean stole from Chuck, though it now looks gray, and he has somehow managed to find a pair of worn-out jeans and an oversized blue cardigan. The circles that already lived under his eyes are darker than ever and, judging from the way his cheekbones jut out, he has lost weight.

None of this detracts from the furious and terrifying look on his face when he finally stops panicking enough to realize where he is.

“Why did you bring me here?” he demands.

“You weren’t answering my prayers,” Dean shrugs.

Cas’s eyes grow wide, and he seems to forget that he is angry for a moment. “You prayed to me?”

“Every night for the last week or so.”

Just like that, his expression darkens again. “I haven’t been able to hear prayers or communicate with my brothers and sisters for a long time.”

“So that’s why I stopped hearing your voice all of a sudden,” Anna says, and Cas stares at her.

“Who are you?” he says.

Anna doesn’t look upset that Cas doesn’t recognize her, but Dean supposes that’s because he never told her she was supposed to be his sister. She does look a little frightened to suddenly have the undivided attention of an angel, though, and part of Dean is relieved because there is now solid proof that someone else can see him.

“I…I’m, uh…”

“Cas, this is Anna. She helped me summon you here.”

Cas squints. “Anna,” he repeats. “Have we met?”

“No,” Anna says at the same time that Dean says “Sort of.”

Anna and Cas stare at him. He clears his throat. “Never mind, we’ve got more important things to talk about. Cas, something weird is going on around here.”

The angel narrows his eyes. “Is that why you called me here? You want me to fix your problems for you?” The power in his voice barely masks the hurt.

“No, Cas, buddy, you gotta understand…it’s not like that.”

“Then what is it ‘like,’ Dean?”

Dean hesitates before deciding to go with the truth. “I miss you,” he says.

Cas raises his eyebrows. “If I remember correctly—and I might not, but I do have written evidence—you’re the one who told me to leave.”

“I know, I know. I’m sorry, Cas. Really, I am. But I remembered some things. Not everything, but I remember enough to know that you were very important to me.” He lowers his head, quietly adding, “You’re still very important to me.”

“Um, Anna, was it?” Cas says, glancing back and forth between Dean and the girl. “Can you please give us a moment alone?”

She nods. “I should get back to my room anyway. Lights out is in five minutes. Good luck, Dean. And Castiel…it was nice to meet you.” She smiles at him as she leaves.

“How much does she know?” Cas asks when she is gone.

“Not a lot. She knows that you’re an angel, but she doesn’t know about the whole parallel universe thing.”

Cas sighs. “I don’t think I’m an angel by anyone’s standards anymore.” He sits on the end of Dean’s bed. Suddenly, he looks very small. “You, um, you said something strange is happing at the hospital? What is it?”

“We can talk about that later,” Dean says, sitting next to him. He nudges Cas with his shoulder. “It’s really good to see you, man.”

“It’s good to see you too, Dean.”

They sit in silence for a minute before Dean says, “Where did you go anyway?”

“Northwest, I think. I was looking for a, um,” he pulls a palm-sized notebook out of his back pocket and opens it to the first page, “a portal, apparently. I’m not quite sure why. After a while, I wasn’t really going anywhere. I was just going.”

“On foot?”

“Mostly. I tried hitchhiking once, but my efforts landed me in a rusted pickup truck with a driver who smelled like rotten cheese. I didn’t try again.”

Dean smirks at the thought of Cas trying to be polite to a guy who smelled like Limburger. “How far did you get?”

“I was in Boise when you summoned me here.”

“As in _Idaho_?”

“Yes, that’s the one.”

Dean whistles. “That’s a long way from Oklahoma.”

“I was gone for a long time.”

“Yeah, you were.”

Another silence.

“Hey, Cas?”

“Yes?”

“I’m sorry about…well, you know.”

“Yes, I know. For the record, I’m sorry as well.”

“For the thing in the crypt?”

“That too,” he says, smiling softly.

Dean shoves at his shoulder lightly. Cas shoves him back.

“Dean?” Cas says after a moment.

“Yeah?”

“I missed you too.”

Dean can’t help it. His heart flutters at the words, and before he knows it, he’s leaning in.

“Am I interrupting something here?” someone says before he can close the distance.

Dean jumps. Cas doesn’t even flinch.

“We were just, uh…”

“Who are you anyway?” Meg asks, ignoring Dean’s explanation and turning to Cas.

Cas is staring at Meg in awe. Before he left, Dean would often catch him staring at her when she would come to check on him at night. Neither of them ever said anything about it. With a Cas that is both visible to other people and having significant memory issues, there’s a bigger problem.

“You,” he says, getting up and approaching the nurse. “I remember you. You took care of me once.”

“Sure about that, pal?”

“He’s a visitor,” Dean interjects. “Friend of mine. He, uh, thinks he knows people he’s never met sometimes.”

“No, I don’t.”

“Visiting hours are over,” Meg says. “Though it sounds like he might need to do more than just visit this place. You got a name, blue eyes?”

Cas’s mouth opens and closes a few times, and Dean wonders whether he doesn’t want to use his real name or just can’t remember it. He looks around the room, and his eyes fall on the copy of _Slaughterhouse-Five_ that he just started reading.

“Kurt,” he says. “His name is Kurt.”

“Well, Kurt, I think the doctors might be interested in talking to you. Why don’t you come back tomorrow and—”

“If it’s all the same to you, I’d rather stay here,” Cas says.

“Sorry, that’s not really allowed unless you’re a patient here, and you aren’t one yet.”

“Please. I have nowhere else to go.”

Meg bites her lip, then sighs. “What can I say? I always was a sucker for blue eyes. Just don’t cause any trouble, and be gone before the other nurse comes in at eight. That girl doesn’t know when to keep her mouth shut.”

“Thank you,” Cas says.

“Don’t mention it, blue eyes,” she smirks. “No seriously, don’t. You’re cute, but you’re not worth losing my job over.” As she’s leaving the room, she stops, turns around, and tilts her head in a way that’s eerily reminiscent of Cas. “You know, you actually do look kind of familiar,” she says. “Maybe we have met after all.”

A moment later, she is gone. Dean and Cas climb into bed, Cas on his back and Dean on his side facing the wall.

“Dean?”

“Yeah Cas?”

“Who was that girl?”

Dean doesn’t want to tell him, but he figures that he owes him the truth.

“Her name is Meg,” Dean says. “I think in our world you guys were sort of friends.”

“I take it you don’t like her very much?”

“That obvious, huh? Well no, we don’t get along very well. But I guess, if she was your friend, she can’t be all bad. Right?” He tries and fails to keep the insecurity out of his voice.

“No one’s all bad, Dean.”

“Yeah?” Dean says. “You really think so?”

Cas responds in a voice so soft that Dean thinks he must know that the conversation isn’t about Meg anymore. “I really do.”

*

The following morning, ‘Kurt Novak’ is checked into Glenwood Springs with a diagnosis of early-onset Alzheimer’s disease. Becky comes to Dean later, looking apologetic as she tells him that a new patient has requested to be his roommate. Her expression changes first to confusion and then to joy when he tells her he doesn’t mind. Twenty minutes later, a second bed is dragged into his room.

“So what exactly is going on here?” says Cas as they sit on their respective beds during rec time.

“Disappearances,” Dean says. “Five that I know of so far.”

“Are you sure they didn’t just check out of the hospital?”

“Pretty sure. They all disappeared within two weeks’ time. None of them mentioned anything about leaving, and some of them have been here for years.”

“Why do you think they would tell you if they were leaving?”

“Cas…they were my friends.”

“Oh. Dean, I’m so sorry. All of them?”

“Yeah.”

“What about the girl from last night?”

“Meg? What about her?”

“No, not her. The other one. With the red hair. You’re friends with her, right?”

“Not really. I mean, she’s nice and all, but I never even talked to her until yesterday.”

“But you like her.”

Dean cocks an eyebrow. “You jealous, Cas?”

“No,” Cas says plainly. “I’m concerned for her. There’s a pattern here. People close to you are disappearing, and if she’s your friend, she could be in danger.”

“Look, can we get off the subject of Anna?”

“Dean, I don’t think you understand—”

“Yeah, well, I do!” Dean bellows. Cas winces. “Why do you think I’m trying not to make any more friends?” He bows his head and runs his hands through his hair, sighing. “Everyone I care about leaves.”

“I won’t leave.”

Dean snorts. “You already did.”

“But I’m back now,” Cas says, moving to sit next to Dean on his bed. “And I won’t leave again.”

“Even if I’m an ass?”

“Yes, even then.”

Dean smiles, but it quickly fades. “How do you know that whatever this is won’t get you too?”

“I can handle myself. Angel, remember?”

“I thought you said you weren’t one anymore.”

“I still have enough divine power left in me to fight, I think. Even in my weakened state, I’m much stronger than an average human like yourself.”

“Sure about that? Because I’m pretty sure I could kick your ass.”

Cas chuckles. “Whatever you say.”


	9. History Lesson

Not becoming friends with Anna proves to be a challenge. That night, she finds Dean and Cas at dinner and sits across from them, smiling brightly.

“So, how are things?” she asks, taking a bite of cornbread, making a face, and putting it back down.

“Peachy,” Dean says. “We still have no idea what’s going on around here, but, other than that, things are just great.”

“Dean,” Cas scolds. “By the way,” he says, turning his attention to Anna. “I never thanked you for reuniting me with Dean last night. I really appreciate it.”

“Oh. No problem. I’m just glad you aren’t going to smite me for it.”

Cas continues to sit up straight and maintain eye contact, but his voice betrays his sheepishness. “I am sorry about that. Being summoned here after months away was…unexpected, and I acted appallingly. It won’t happen again.”

“Apology accepted. So, you and Dean kiss and make up?”

Dean chokes on his cornbread.

“No, there was no kissing involved,” Cas says, squinting.

Anna raises her eyebrows. “O…kay.”

“Stop with the look,” Dean says when he is no longer choking. “Nothing happened.”

“What look? I’m not giving any look. And I’m certainly not wondering about your sleeping arrangements given that, until today, there was only one bed in your room.”

“Shut up.”

“How did you know how to summon an angel?” Cas asks, seemingly unaware of the tension at the table.

“Oh, that. I, um, I kind of hear angels talking in my head. That’s why I’m here. It’s annoying when I’m trying to sleep, but after a while you pick up some useful tips.”

“You can pick up on celestial frequencies?” Cas says. “Fascinating.”

Anna beams.

The next day is devoted to research. Dean finds the history and mythology books that he never got around to reading, and he and Cas pour over them at every available opportunity. Fortunately, Cas still has enough angel in him that he reads insanely fast. Unfortunately, he forgets almost everything he reads shortly after reading it, so his progress is delayed by note-taking.

When they meet for dinner with Anna and she asks them whether or not they made any progress, Cas pulls out his notebook, in which he has taken about a dozen pages of notes on American history. Dean just shrugs and says, “Not really.”

“I made it about halfway through the history book Dean found. I have been looking for discrepancies between this universe and our own.”

“Between what now?” Anna says.

“Oh yeah, that’s another thing I might have forgotten to tell you,” Dean says. “Cas and I are from an alternate dimension.”

“Oh,” says Anna, looking bewildered.

“It seems this version of the United States managed to elect a female president before the turn of the century—good for you, by the way, though I’m sure you couldn’t vote at the time.” He shuffles through his notes some more. “Gas is also significantly cheaper here, though tin foil is nearly unaffordable.”

“Why?” Dean says.

“It’s tin foil,” Anna shrugs, as though that explains it.

“In 1978, Switzerland launched a nuclear war on the United States. As a result, Swiss cheese, Swiss chocolate, and Swiss army knives are now considered contraband in every state except North Carolina.”

“Now you’re just making stuff up.”

“No, it’s true,” Anna says. “My cousin went to Charlotte once just to try Swiss chocolate. She says it’s amazing.”

“Anything _useful,_ Cas?”

“I’m not sure,” Cas admits. “I’m having some trouble remembering U.S. history from your own world, so I may have written down a few things that happened there too.”

“Let me see,” Dean sighs. Cas hands him his notes, and Dean flips through the pages.

“Cas, I think the Cold War actually happened.”

“Really? I thought that that one couldn’t possibly exist in more than one universe.”

“Hey, who’s this Marv Schreiber guy that gets mentioned a few times?”

“Him? According to the book, he’s a senator. His name came up so much that I thought he might be important.”

“Senator?” Anna says. “That book must be old. Schreiber’s president now.”

Cas looks at Dean. “That’s not the name of the president in your world, is it?”

“I don’t think so.”

They look at the history book together after dinner, and they find a page with Schreiber’s picture on it.

“I know him!” Dean says. “I don’t know when or where I know him from, but I’ve definitely seen that scumbag before.”

“You form opinions on people very quickly,” Cas observes.

“Do not,” Dean says, crossing his arms. Cas gives him a knowing look. “Okay, maybe I do, but this time there’s a reason. I can’t remember what he did, but this guy is bad news. Trust me.”

“I will admit that something about him seems…untrustworthy.”

“Think he could have anything to do with everything that’s gone down?”

“I don’t know, but I think it might be a good place to start.”

*

No one seems to know all that much about the mysterious man who suddenly became the face of the news almost a decade ago and has since gone on to lead the nation, but everyone has an opinion on him.

“He’s a godsend,” Bela gushes. “I think he’s the first president we’ve had who actually gets stuff done. When Schreiber makes a promise, he keeps it.”

“And what kind of promises has he made exactly?” Cas says, scribbling something down in his notebook.

“Well he…oh I don’t know. Lots of things. Look him up if you’re curious.”

“You can’t name even one thing he’s done since he’s been in office?”

Bela ponders the question for a moment. “He promised that he would make things better, and they are.”

“In what sense?”

“They just are,” Bela shrugs.

*

“He’s got the whole country wrapped around his dirty little finger, but I see through the act,” Gabriel says. “Wants everyone to think he cares about people—that he’s going to make things better for everyone. Well, he’s been in office for two years now, so tell me this: if things are so much better, why do we still get treated like second-class citizens in a place that’s supposed to cater to our mental well-being? Why have tin foil prices steadily increased since the day he was put in office? Why can’t I stream porn for free without getting a computer virus? It’s all a sham.”

*

“He seems nice,” Garth says. Mr. Fizzles the sock puppet scoffs and looks away, mumbling something about brainwashing.

*

“Good for nothin’ democrat scum,” Martin Creaser, the army veteran, says.

“I read that he ran as an independent,” Dean says.

“Bah,” says Martin, waving his hand dismissively. “They’re all the same.”

*

“His politics seem sound,” Chuck says, scribbling on the table with a straw.

“But what _are_ his politics?” Dean asks.

“I dunno.”

“Forget about his politics,” says Becky. “Can we please talk about his personal hygiene? I mean, it was almost okay when he was just a senator, but I think it’s his duty as president to make sure he looks neat and well groomed at all times. The greasy, poofy, I-dyed-it-but-left-some-gray-in-on-purpose hair and scraggly half-beard have got to go. And his teeth! Don’t get me started.”

*

“Man, he says he cares about homeless people and all that, but what about the ones who’ve had a troubled past? Do you think he cares about us when we’re on the streets because we blew all our money on crack and have to start selling the stuff just to afford a bite to eat every now and then? No. He has this fucked-up idealistic view of the world, and he only cares about people who are in trouble if they’ve always been innocent little angels. But let me tell you, those kinds of people? They don’t exist.”

It makes Dean uncomfortable that Ruby is the only person so far that has been able to tell him anything specific about Schreiber’s politics, but he’ll take what he can get.

“So what’s he done to show that he thinks that way?” Cas asks. “Has he spoken ill of those with drug addictions?”

“Nah, but I can just tell. Rich old white men like that never care about real people problems. We’re on our own in this world, and we can’t trust politicians or anyone else to make our lives better for us. We have to look out for ourselves.” She turns to Cas. “Remember that, kid.”

Cas promises that he will.

*

“Yeah, politics aren’t really my thing,” Meg says. “Though the old fart always did seem a little skeevy, if you ask me.”

*

“So basically, this super-influential and powerful guy, who swoops out of nowhere ten years ago and works his way up to president, hasn’t even done anything significant enough to make people remember what he’s done or what he stands for. Great.” Dean sighs and flops onto his bed. It’s been a long day of questioning people and it feels like they’ve made no progress at all.

“Maybe that’s a clue,” Cas says. “Maybe he has somehow brainwashed people into electing him without them even knowing his politics.”

“Yeah, or maybe people are just as misinformed in this universe as they are in ours.”

“Either way, it was a long shot. I’m not even sure how we would proceed if we did discover that he was using witchcraft.”

“We could always bust out of here, hitchhike to D.C., sneak into the oval office, and bash him over the head with a chair.”

“I don’t think that would be very wise,” Cas starts before he notices that Dean is grinning. “Oh. You were being facetious.”

“Hey, Cas? How come you can’t remember half the people you’re supposed to know, but you still talk more like a dictionary than a human?”

“It’s a lot more than half,” Cas says. “And I’m not human.”

“Oh,” Dean says. “Right. I forget sometimes.”

“Really?”

“Well, yeah. I mean, I still don’t have any real evidence that you’re an angel and not just a regular guy who used to be really good at making himself invisible.”

“I don’t think humans can do that.”

“What about magicians?”

“Even so, I don’t think magicians can be summoned from over a thousand miles away using Enochian symbols.”

“Fair enough,” Dean says. “But I don’t have any proof that you were really in Idaho either. Point is, I’m taking a lot on faith here—no pun intended. I didn’t see much of your angel side before, and I see almost none of it now. So it’s easy to forget that you’re supposed to be some super-powerful being who’s been alive for millennia and probably looks down on us puny humans like we’re bugs.”

Cas frowns. “You really think that?”

“I mean, yeah, you do kind of blend in at this point…”

“That’s not what I meant. You really think I look down upon humans as lesser beings?”

Dean hesitates. “Don’t you?”

Cas shakes his head. “It’s true that angels are powerful, but we tend to lack empathy. I think I was like that once, before I met you. I don’t remember all that I’ve done, but I know that I’ve helped destroy cities and towns, chose who deserved to be saved and who deserved eternal damnation, all in the name of God.”

“Hate to break it to you, but humans do the same thing.”

“Not all of them. You have the freedom to choose your own path, to find happiness and sadness and love rather than spend your existence following orders. And, even more importantly, you have the ability to do something that angels can never do.”

“What’s that?”

“Create,” Cas says. “Angels are made to destroy, but humans can create technology and civilizations and even new life. You’re amazing. You build on ideas generation after generation. I don’t think I will ever tire of watching you grow.”

“Then why are you so afraid of becoming one?”

“I’m not afraid,” Cas says indignantly. Dean raises an eyebrow, and Cas sighs. “I just don’t want to forget you.”

Dean feels his heart melt. He hears a voice in the back of his head nagging him that what he is about to do is stupid, but he chooses to ignore it. “Then let me give you something to remember.” In two long strides, he crosses the room from his bed to the one where Cas sits. He stops in front of the almost-human, staring down at him as he cups his jaw with one hand. Before he can talk himself out of it, he leans down and closes the distance between their lips.

The kiss is fast and chaste. It’s over in a second (too quickly for Cas to reciprocate and far too quickly for Dean’s liking) but he knows that anything more would be unfair to Cas, since he’s still not completely sure that Cas wants this. He backs up but lets his hand linger on Cas’s jaw for a moment, rubbing the rough cheek with his thumb.

He drops his hand when Cas stands. They are only inches apart, breathing in each other’s air, and Dean isn’t sure whether Cas is going to smite him or initiate a never-ending staring contest. He is about to apologize when Cas grabs the back of his neck and pulls him in again.

This time, they are sloppy and needy and rushed. Cas hangs onto Dean’s neck for dear life, and Dean reaches up to thread his fingers through Cas’s increasingly messy hair. Cas is quick to add tongue, and he explores Dean’s mouth as if any moment he is going to forget what it feels like. Dean wonders if he might do just that.

Dean pulls back first, and Cas tries to follow him with his lips before realizing what happened and opening his eyes. Dean can’t decide whether he looks confused or disappointed or something else entirely.

“It’s, uh,” Dean coughs. “It’s almost time for Meg to come in for head count.”

“Oh,” Cas says, not blinking.

When Meg comes in a few minutes later, they are lying in the dark in their respective beds. A minute after that, Cas creeps out of his own bed and walks over to Dean’s.

“May I?” he whispers.

“You know Becky’s going to tell everyone if she comes in tomorrow morning and finds us spooning.” He scoots over and lifts the cover in invitation anyway.

“I set an alarm on my watch.” He gets into bed next to Dean and lies facing him. Dean slings an arm over his waist. “I’ll get into the other bed at five minutes before eight.”

“When did you get a watch?”

Cas squints down at his wrist which does, in fact, have a digital watch strapped to it. “I’m not sure,” he says.

Dean chuckles softly. “Night.” And, for the first time, he gets to kiss Cas goodnight. Cas’s lips are soft and warm, and when he breaks the kiss he finds him smiling contentedly with his eyes closed. A moment more, and he is snoring lightly. The sound is strangely soothing, and Dean is glad to be able to listen to it up close. It’s proof that Cas is there and that, even if he is losing more memories every day, he’s okay. He’s alive.

Dean doesn’t know how he ever got to sleep without it.


	10. Sympathy for the Devil

Days pass and turn into weeks. Still they find no leads. Dean and Cas swap their myth and history books, but other than being vaguely surprised that _Myths and Legends_ has no mention of werewolves (were-rabbits are apparently terrifying, however), they don’t find anything at all.

Cas’s memory is rapidly deteriorating. He talks less, letting Dean take the lead with most conversations and looking as though he’s never quite sure what’s going on. He no longer stares at Meg with wonder, and when they have dinner with Anna, she often has to remind him who she is. For some reason (probably stubbornness), he never forgets Dean.

Their relationship—or whatever the correct term is for the sometimes-physical mutual affection that Dean chooses not to label—remains a comfortable constant in both of their lives. There is the occasional heavy make-out session that leads to frantic groping (and once to a messy hand job), but mostly they just share bed space and reassuring caresses in the dark. They cling to each other in their sleep as if they are afraid the other might disappear. And then, at 7:55 each morning, Cas’s alarm goes off and they are done.

They don’t talk about it.

One morning, Becky comes in early and sees them fast asleep in each other’s arms, Cas’s head resting on Dean’s chest and Dean’s face buried in Cas’s hair. She tiptoes out of the room and decides to come back later. Dean and Cas resume their daily routine none the wiser.

Anna probably suspects that something is going on between them. Sometimes she looks back and forth between them and smiles when they stare at each other for too long, but then she always resumes eating her lunch or asks how their research is going. When Cas forgets where they are one day at dinner, he grabs Dean’s hand and squeezes until Dean thinks his fingers might break. Rather than point it out, Anna helps calm him down. She reminds him where he is and who she is and teaches him to take deep breaths. It strikes Dean then how grateful he is for her and all that she has done for both of them.

Two days later, Anna is gone.

Dean decides to pretend that nothing is wrong so that Cas won’t worry. Halfway through dinner, he notices anyway.

“Where is she?” Cas says, spork clattering to his dinner tray and eyes wide with panic.

“Where’s who?”

“Dean, don’t pretend you don’t know for my benefit. The red-haired girl. The kind one. Where is she? Was she here earlier?”

Dean rubs his forehead, looking away. “No, I haven’t seen her all day.”

“Did she say she was leaving? Why would she leave?”

“I don’t know, but I’m sure she’s fine,” Dean lies.

“No, you can’t know that. She could be hurt. You could get hurt next!” Cas is standing now, shouting, eyes darting frantically around the cafeteria. Other patients stare.

“Cas.” He aims for a tone that is reassuring, but all that comes out is a harsh whisper. “It’s okay. She’s okay and so am I. Please sit down.”

 _“Where is she?”_ Cas screams. _“Where is she?”_

A burly, bald security guard arrives at the table.

“Don’t!” Dean yells, but the guard ignores him. “I can calm him down. Just let him go!”

The guard grabs Cas’s arms and tries to pin them to his sides, but either he isn’t as strong as he looks or Cas still has a bit of angelic strength left because the guard can’t restrain him. He calls for backup, and Meg arrives with a large needle. A few more seconds of struggling and Meg gets the needle into Cas’s arm. He goes limp.

“Cas!” Dean screams. He runs after the guard who is dragging him away, not caring that he isn’t using the name that the whole hospital knows him by.

“Get back,” the guard says. “Unless you want to be sedated too.” Dean thinks he sees Meg give him a look of sympathy, but he isn’t sure. He can’t see straight.

“Cas,” he says more quietly, reaching for the nearly-unconscious man’s hand and giving it a tight squeeze. “It’s going to be okay.”

The guard and Meg drag him away, and Dean has to let go of Cas’s hand. He stays where he is and stares at the cafeteria door until another nurse takes him back to his seat.

*

“Cas?” Dean whispers when he gets back to their room after dinner, but Cas is fast asleep in his own bed. It’s the first time he has actually slept there.

Dean kicks off his shoes and climbs into bed next to him, wrapping an arm around Cas’s waist and pulling him close.

“Ungh,” Cas groans with his eyes still closed. “Dean?”

“Yeah, Cas. I’m here.”

“Where’d you go?”

“Not important,” Dean says, not bothering to tell him that it was Cas who left. “I’m here now. I won’t leave again.”

“Good,” Cas says and snuggles deeper into his chest. “I don’t know what I would do if you were gone.”

“Don’t worry.” He runs a hand through Cas’s hair. The angel sighs contentedly. “I’m not going anywhere.”

*

Cas wakes up at 7:55, as usual. He greets Dean with a good morning kiss and stumbles out of bed only to find that the room has flipped itself during the night. Or maybe he just forgot which way things are supposed to go.

Dean is on his feet in a second, explaining that they slept in Cas’s bed that night. Cas doesn’t remember that, but he gets back into the bed Dean says is his while Dean gets into the other. As soon as they are settled, a blonde nurse walks in.

“Good morning boys!” she says brightly. “Kurt, I hope you’re feeling better today.”

Cas furrows his brow. “Who’s Kurt?”

“Oh dear,” she says. “I’d better go get a doctor.”

“No!” Dean says, and Cas and the nurse stare at him. “I mean…Becky, can I talk to you in the hall?”

“I guess, but I still need to…”

Dean leads her into the hallway and closes the door behind them before she can finish her sentence.

Cas sits up in bed and feels under his pillow for his notebook. When he first arrived back at the hospital, he would read through the entire notebook every morning and every night. Now thoughts slip out of his head faster than he can put them back in, and remembering every single detail of the last few months seems unnecessary.

He flips to the page he has dog-eared and reads the words over and over until Dean returns.

*

“Listen, Becky,” Dean whispers. “I know you’re a nurse and you have authority over me and all, but I think it might be best if we don’t tell Ca—I mean, Kurt—anything about yesterday or correct him when he forgets things.”

Becky crosses her arms. “Why not?”

“You saw how he freaked out yesterday. All that was just because he realized Anna was gone. He was fine until he remembered she was supposed to be there. Do you really think he’s going to react well if we start reminding him of things?”

“I…” Becky says. For once, she seems at a loss for words.

“He has early Alzheimer’s right? Don’t worry, he told me that, not you. He’s going to forget everything anyway, and he can’t get better. Pretty soon he’ll forget how to eat and drink and breathe. Why make his last few months any more painful than they need to be?”

The nurse bites her lip. “You really care about him, don’t you?”

Dean is going to protest, but then he thinks better of it. “Yeah,” he says truthfully. “I do.”

Becky gives him what Dean considers her best smile—the one that looks more genuine and less like her mouth is being forcibly held in a position it should never be in. “Don’t worry. I won’t say anything,” she says before she leaves to go to the next room.

Dean feels a rush of affection for the often-annoying nurse. Which of course makes him worry for her safety.

When he reenters the room, Cas asks him when the blonde nurse will be coming in.

*

Dean worries all morning that someone will mention the events of the previous day in front of Cas. Luckily, the other patients remember about as much about Cas’s episode as Cas does. Or maybe they simply don’t care anymore. There are more important things to worry about, it seems. There are whispers all through the hospital all day, and for once they aren’t about Dean.

_Did you hear that he’s back? Have you seen him yet? I heard he looks like death. He’s back he’s back he’s back._

The whispers continue through lunchtime. Then, ten minutes after Dean sits down to eat, the cafeteria goes quiet.

Dean looks up to find dozens of pairs of eyes trained on a spot at the front of the room. He turns around and finds a man standing at the door. He’s thin and pale, and his sandy hair is greasy and matted. His eyes are the worst thing. Dean is too far away to see what color they are, but he can still see them clearly enough to tell that they look cold and dead. He is wearing handcuffs.

“Who’s that?” Dean whispers as the man is led forward by guards.

“Nick Lucier,” Becky responds. “He was only here for a couple of weeks after I started.”

“Where’d he go?”

“Solitary.”

“He’s been in solitary all this time? But it’s been months!”

“Shh!” Becky says as the man passes by their table. He makes eye contact with Dean and smirks.

“They call him Lucifer,” Chuck says a few minutes later when Lucier is sitting at a table with the guards and the other patients have finally started talking again. “Because he might as well be the devil.”

“I heard he’s been a patient here for even longer than you,” Becky says to Dean. “Like twenty years. But he’s been to solitary like a dozen times. He’s probably spent more time there than he has here.”

“I heard he has to spend the rest of his life seeking mental care because he killed his own brother. The only reason he didn’t go to prison is because he pled insanity.”

“They wouldn’t really just let him walk around with other patients if he’d killed a guy, would they?” Becky says.

Chuck shrugs. “Well, we know he tried to stab Adam because he thought he was his brother. And look, he’s back again.”

Dean shakes his head. Chuck denies it, but he’s just as much of a gossip as Becky. “I don’t know what he’s done, but I’m staying out of his way. That guy creeps me out.”

It’s only then that he realizes that Cas has been silent since Lucier first walked into the room.

“Hey,” Dean says, touching his shoulder. “You okay?”

“Lucifer,” Cas says, staring at the man a few tables away as though he is in a trance. “That’s my brother, Lucifer.”

Dean is sure Becky and Chuck’s eyes are going to bug out of their heads. “He’s your what?” Becky says.

“You remember him?” Dean says.

Cas nods. “I haven’t seen him since…since the last time I was here. Or somewhere. The last time my brain stopped working. Why can’t I see his wings?”

Chuck and Becky are looking more puzzled by the minute.

“Uh, Becky, is it okay if I take Kurt back to our room a little early?” Dean says. “I think he’s feeling…confused.”

“Yeah,” Becky says, still staring at Cas. “Okay. Just give me a minute to finish my lunch and I’ll walk you there.”

*

Cas is scared.

He doesn’t experience fear very often, but when he sees his brother in the cafeteria he is terrified. He isn’t sure why, after forgetting so many of his brothers and sisters, he recognizes Lucifer instantly. But he does know that his brother is dangerous, and he doesn’t want him anywhere near Dean.

If only he knew what to do about it.

Before he has the chance to do anything, Dean and a blonde woman are leading him out of the room and down a wide hallway. He is taken to a white room with two beds, and he remembers that the room belongs to Dean. He wonders if it’s time for bed.

“Cas,” Dean says to him when they are alone in the room, sitting on the end of one of the beds. “You okay?”

Cas nods, but then he changes his mind and shakes his head.

“Was that really your brother back there?”

“Yes,” Cas responds. “That was Lucifer.”

“Lucifer. As in Satan?”

“Some denominations of Christianity view them as one in the same, yes.”

“Son of a bitch. That’s gotta be it!”

“It’s got to be what?”

“The bastard who put us here,” Dean says. “The one who’s making people disappear. It has to be him! Who else could it be?”

Cas had forgotten that they were in the wrong universe, but the realization hits him like a ton of bricks. “I have to go,” he says, heading for the door.

“Whoa, Cas!” Dean stops him with a hand on his shoulder. “Where are you going?”

“To kill him,” Cas says, shrugging his hand away.

“What? No!”

Cas ignores him, reaching for the doorknob again.

“Cas!” Dean says, grabbing him roughly by the arms, turning him around, and slamming his back against the door. “You can’t kill him.”

“Why not? He put you in danger.”

“That doesn’t mean you can just go out and kill the guy!”

“He’s not a guy, Dean. He’s an angel, and a malicious one. You might not remember what he is capable of, but I do.”

“Maybe that’s true in our world,” Dean says. “And it might even be true here, but it might not. As far as we know, that could just be a regular guy with some major issues. And even if he’s not, everyone else thinks he is. You murder him here and you’re going to land yourself in solitary for the rest of your life. And that’s not even considering the fact that he might try to kill you too. What were you even going to use as a weapon? Your shoe?”

He has a point. “So what do we do?”

“Why don’t we start by talking to him? If he really is behind all this, maybe we can reason with him.”

“We can’t reason with Lucifer.”

“Why not?”

“He’s unreasonable. Besides, he might try to kill us.”

“Oh, now you’re concerned about that.”

“I’m concerned that he might kill _you_.”

“So what, we’re just going to sit in here and do nothing?”

“No,” Cas says. “I’m going to talk to him and see what I can find out. He won’t help us intentionally, but if I could find out how he brought us here, maybe I could figure out how to send us back.”

“You aren’t going without me,” Dean says, and Cas realizes that Dean is still pinning his arms to the door.

“Dean…”

“Cas.”

“I don’t want you to get hurt.”

“Then don’t do anything that will leave me feeling guilty and devastated,” Dean says. “Because that’s what I’ll be if he hurts you and I’m not there to stop it.”

“I can’t talk you out of this, can I?”

“Nope.”

Cas sighs in resignation. “Okay, let’s go.”


	11. A Deal with the Devil

They find a door down the hall with a piece of paper that says “Lucier, Nicholas” taped to the front. Dean holds his breath as he knocks.

For several seconds, there is no answer. Then, just when they are about to give up, the door cracks open and a single eye peers out of the dark room.

“What?” the man inside says. His voice isn’t nearly as deep or intimidating as Dean had imagined.

“My name’s Dean Winchester, and this here’s Kurt. We were hoping we might be able to talk to you for a minute.”

The eye narrows. “Why?”

“It’s not a matter that can be discussed out in the open,” Cas says. “Please, it’s of the utmost importance.”

“What’s in it for me?”

Dean and Cas look at each other, then back at the cracked door. “Name your price,” says Dean.

Through the crack, the man grins. “That’s what I was hoping you’d say.” He opens the door to reveal a room with bars on the windows and barely enough space for the single bed.

“Please, sit.” The man gestures to the bed, and Dean wonders how someone so courteous can make his skin crawl. He and Cas sit on the end of the bed next to each other. Lucifer remains standing, staring down at them.

“First thing’s first,” he says. “Do you know a nurse here who goes by Adam Milligan?”

“The one you tried to kill?” Dean says without thinking.

“That’s the one,” Lucifer smiles wickedly, and Dean decides the nickname fits. “Though I assure you, I had good reason. Believe me, Dean, I’m not the bad guy here.”

“Yeah, well bad guy or not, we’re not helping you off the poor bastard.”

“Not exactly what I had in mind,” he chuckles, digging through his nightstand until he finds a scrap of paper and a pencil. He scribbles something on the paper before folding it twice and handing it to Dean. “All I want is for you to give him this. I’d do it myself, but apparently I’m not allowed within ten feet of him.”

Dean takes the note, flips it over in his hands.

“And no peeking. Trust me, I’ll know.”

Dean isn’t sure how Lucifer could possibly know whether or not he read an unsealed note, but he decides not to question it. He nods and puts the note in his pocket. “Done. Now, we have a few questions.”

Lucifer leans back against the wall, arms crossed as far as they can go in his handcuffs. “I’m all ears.”

“How much do you know about alternate dimensions?” Cas asks.

He whistles. “Big question there. But I suppose I know enough to tell that you’re from one.”

Neither Dean nor Cas quite knows how to respond to that, so they opt for glancing at each other in shock.

“Before you jump to conclusions, I’m not the one who put you here, so you can get that idea out of your head.”

“If you didn’t put us here,” says Cas, “then how do you know where we’re from?”

“Well I don’t know _where_ you’re from, per se, but I do know that it isn’t here.”

“How?” Dean says.

“You might not believe me, but you and I were friends once, Dean. Well, maybe not friends. More like mutual benefactors. I scratched your back, you got MacLeod off mine. Point is, I _know_ Dean Winchester, and I know he’d never come in this room unless he was trying to weasel the good stuff out of me.”

“The good stuff?”

Lucifer smirks as he pulls up a loose floorboard by his feet, reaching in and pulling out a baggy of brown powder.

Dean scowls. “What makes you think I want that?”

“Oh, I know you don’t. You see, I can read people, Dean. I know what they want. And unlike you, the Dean Winchester I knew wanted nothing more than to feel happy for once.”

“I’m plenty happy, thanks.”

“No you’re not,” Lucifer snorts. He cocks his head to the side. It doesn’t look like Cas’s confused head tilt at all; the movement is cold, reptilian. “And you don’t want to be.” He tosses the bag into the air, catches it, tosses it again. “But that’s okay. I know you won’t tell anyone about this. You wouldn’t want your friend over there to disappear like all the others.”

Dean sees red. Before he knows what he’s doing, Lucifer is slammed against the wall with Dean’s hand around his throat. “What’d you do to them you sick son of a bitch?”

Lucifer laughs, hollow and manic. Dean tightens his grip on his throat, and the laugh dissolves into shallow coughs.

“Dean!” Dean feels a pair of strong hands pull him away by his shoulders. “This isn’t what we came here to do.”

He loosens his grip, and then he lets go entirely. He allows himself to be dragged towards the other side of the room.

When Lucifer is able to stop coughing, he laughs again. “I didn’t do anything to your friends, Winchester. Had nothing to do with them disappearing. I was kinda busy being locked up in solitary confinement, in case you hadn’t heard.”

“Then how’d you know what happened to them?”

“Well I don’t know what _happened_ to them. All I know is that they were your friends, and one by one they disappeared without a trace. I feel bad for you, really.”

“But how do you know that?”

The devil smiles. “I have eyes and ears all over this place. Having nearly everyone in the hospital be afraid of me works in my favor sometimes. You used to be one of my best spies. Or someone who looked like you was, anyway.”

“That’s another thing. If you weren’t involved in any of this universe-swapping missing-person shit, how come you’ve accepted it all so easily?”

“Because, in addition to being so gosh darn pretty, I’m also very, very smart. And I have a lot of time on my hands. I worked out the existence of parallel universes ages ago. Granted, this is the first solid proof I’ve seen, but it was bound to happen sooner or later. It’s really not surprising. Besides,” he points at Cas, “Dean Winchester doesn’t have friends. Other than me, of course. And he hates me.”

“Yeah, I’m not too fond of you myself.”

Lucifer huffs indignantly, placing the bag of heroin over his heart.

Dean ignores him, pinching the bridge of his nose. “So let me get this straight. You believe us, but you didn’t have anything to do with our reality swap or the patient disappearances, and you don’t know who is responsible.”

“I didn’t say all that. Someone in this hospital had something to do with this and hasn’t gotten the balls to speak up yet.”

“Should I bother asking how you know?” Dean asks.

“I’m very perceptive.”

“Are you going to tell us who it is?” says Cas.

“Well that would just take all the fun out of it, wouldn’t it?” Lucifer grins. “Don’t worry, I think you’ll find out soon enough. I look forward to watching the chaos unfold.”

Dean scowls. “Do you have anything helpful to offer? At all?”

Lucifer squints at the ceiling, eyes shifting back and forth as if he is searching for the answer in the air. He shakes his head. “Nah.”

That’s all Dean needs to hear. He ushers Cas out of the room as Lucifer calls out to them, “Don’t forget to deliver my message!”

“Do you think he knows more than he said?” Cas asks as he trots after Dean.

“Who knows? Doesn’t matter anyway. Bastard probably wouldn’t tell us even if he did.”

They’ve walked three doors past their room when Cas says, “Um, Dean? Wasn’t our room back there somewhere?”

“Just taking this to Adam,” he says, holding up the folded note Lucifer gave him. “I don’t want to hold onto it for any longer than necessary.”

“Oh. Well how do you know where he is?”

“Don’t. I’m just going to keep walking until I find him.”

They have walked all the way down the hall and started back up again when Dean notices a figure standing in the entrance to his room, shoulders tense and neck craning through the doorway while his feet remain in the hall. Chuck turns around, looking lost, before he spots Cas and Dean. His eyebrows shoot into his hairline.

“Dean!” he says, jogging to meet them in the middle of the hallway. “I need to talk to you.”

“Little busy,” Dean says, continuing his trek. Chuck falls into step behind him.

“It’s really important,” Chuck says. “Like life or death maybe.”

“Life or death for someone in the real world or in one of those stories you refuse to write down?”

“Um, both, kind of.”

Dean stops in his tracks. “Have you been writing again?”

Chuck gulps. “It was an accident.”

“Oh for the love of…look, let’s go back to my room and talk about this, okay?”

Chuck nods, eyes wide.

They reach Dean and Cas’s room and Dean shuts the door behind them. “Okay, spill. What tragedy did you write me into?”

“Well, I didn’t…exactly,” Chuck says. “Technically speaking, it’s not even a story.”

Dean suddenly notices the wrinkled sheet of notebook paper that Chuck is folding and unfolding in his hands. “Is that the not-story right there?”

Chuck stops fidgeting with the paper. His hands are shaking. “Listen, Dean, I know you don’t believe what I write actually has any effect on the outside world but—”

“No,” Dean interrupts, “I’m, uh, learning to be less skeptical.” Chuck doesn’t looks convinced.

“It’s okay,” Cas says. “Just tell us what’s going on. You said it’s life or death?”

“It could be, in a manner of speaking—”

“Chuck.”

“Right. What’s going on. Um. I suppose I should start from the beginning.

“I woke up one morning a few weeks ago to find a sheet of paper on my bedsides table. Now, normally I’d just assume it belonged to my roommate since I no longer allow myself to own paper of any kind, but Garth has been my roommate for a few months now and he’s very respectful of my space as well as my ‘no paper or writing utensils out in the open’ rule.

“Being curious, I flipped the paper over to see if there was anything written on it. I know I shouldn’t have touched it, but you must understand that writers are naturally curious and—”

“Lights out is in fifteen minutes,” Dean says. “Might want to hurry it up a bit.”

“Oh. Yes. Getting to the point. Sorry. Anyway, it was a list. No title, no prose, just some weird symbols and a list of names. More specifically, it was a list with the names of your friends who had disappeared just a few days before.” He holds the list up to eye-level, reading off names. “‘Charlie Bradbury, Kevin Tran, Jody Mills, Jo Harvelle, Bobby Singer.’ And I thought, no big deal, someone probably just made a list of the recent disappearances because of some personality quirk and the list somehow ended up in my room. But here’s the thing: it was in my handwriting.

“I should have told you then. I knew you were asking about them, but I didn’t want to believe that it was true. I mean, I didn’t even remember writing this thing. For all I knew, Gabe learned forgery and decided to play a practical joke on me. And I thought there was nothing I could do about it anyway. Everyone on the list was gone and I didn’t know how to bring them back. It was out of my hands.

“But then, a few days ago, a new name appeared on the list. ‘Anna Milton.’ And then she disappeared too.”

“It was you,” Dean says, pointing a finger at the writer. “You’re the one Lucifer was talking about. You’re the one who’s responsible for all of this!”

“It’s not his fault,” Cas states, walking behind Chuck to get a glimpse of the paper. “He didn’t know.”

“He knew something was up!” Dean begins to pace the floor. “But he didn’t bother to tell me that until it was too late for _six people_. Why are you here now anyway? Conscience finally get the better of you?”

“I-I—”

“Or do you actually have something useful to say? Because I’ve gotta tell you, I am fed up with cryptic messages and false leads from people who either can’t or won’t help me.”

“Dean,” Cas says.

“What?”

“I think you should listen to him.”

“Yeah? Why?”

“There’s another name on the list.”

Dean stops pacing. He stares at Chuck; Chuck stares back.

“I’m sorry,” Chuck says evenly, not breaking eye contact. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner. But I’m afraid it isn’t over.” He hands the list to Dean, trembling.

The last name, written in even letters at the bottom, is _Becky Rosen._


	12. Written in Stone

Dean doesn’t know what to do.

Part of him wants to find Becky, tell her what’s going on, and keep an eye on her until he knows she is safe. Another part of him remembers that Becky’s shift ended hours ago and that he couldn’t realistically guard her forever and that she probably wouldn’t believe him anyway.

He feels helpless. Completely and totally helpless.

He isn’t aware that he is throwing things at the wall until he feels hands on his shoulders and hears Cas’s rough voice in his ear whispering, “It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s okay.”

When he is calm enough to see straight, he notices Chuck, wide-eyed and trembling even more than he was before, picking up the crumpled list off the floor and gently smoothing it out. The room is a disaster. Paper from the wastebasket is strewn everywhere, a tray and the half-eaten remains of that morning’s breakfast are splattered across the floor, and  _Slaughterhouse-Five_ ,its pages fanned out, lies beaten and dejected in the corner. It’s a good thing no nurses are around to see it.

Cas is still rubbing his hands up and down Dean’s shoulders, murmuring into his ear. Dean isn’t sure what he is saying, but it comforts him all the same.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “It’s just…another one. Damn.”

“Believe me, Dean, I understand,” Chuck says earnestly. “I might not show my anger as openly as you do—no offence—but I’m furious too. I…I can’t let this…this _thing_ take Becky away. I won’t.”

Dean and Cas exchange a look before turning back to Chuck. It’s Cas who speaks up first. “You love her.”

The tips of Chuck’s ears go red. “I, well I…”

“I thought Becky annoyed the hell out of you,” Dean adds. He usually doesn’t try to pressure people into talking about their feelings given that he hates doing so himself, but he has to wonder when this development took place. Was he so wrapped up in his own affairs that he didn’t notice that the man he ate lunch with every day was developing feelings for his overly-enthusiastic nurse?

“She does,” Chuck says. “But she’s…grown on me.” He gives Dean a pointed look. “It appears she’s grown on you too.”

Dean feels his face grow warm against his will. He doesn’t harbor any sexual or romantic feelings for his nurse, but he has grown fond of her, despite himself. He shrugs. “Becky has her issues, but she cares a lot about her patients. Which is more than can be said for most of the rest of the staff in this dump.”

“Well, don’t you know how to flatter a girl?”

Three heads turn to find Meg standing in the doorway, eyebrow raised and arms crossed over her chest.

“Nurse Masters!” Chuck says. “We were just—”

“Going to your own room for lights out,” Meg finishes for him. “Now.”

Chuck gulps, leaving the room without another word.

“What the hell happened in here?” she demands, hands on her hips as she surveys the mess.

Dean opens his mouth to respond, but Cas speaks up before he can. “There was a spider.”

Meg raises a perfectly-sculpted eyebrow. “A spider,” she repeats skeptically.

“Yes. A poisonous one, you must understand. Otherwise, we would have taken it outside.”

“And you decided that the best way to kill it was to throw food and garbage at it.”

“Hey, it worked, didn’t it?” Dean adds. “Go ahead and check. You won’t find a single spider in this room. Well, no living ones anyway.”

She glares at Dean. “Was I talking to you?” She then turns her attention to the spilled breakfast, squatting beside the mess and using the napkins on the floor to scoop the food back onto the tray. “I’ll take this back to the kitchen to be cleaned, but you can pick up the trash yourself.” 

“Listen,” Dean starts, “when I said Becky cared more than the rest of the staff, I meant—”

“Save it, sweet cheeks. I know I’m not one of the special few that you’ve decided are worthy of your friendship. Really, I don’t care.” She turns to Cas, smirking up at him. “Besides, I know you still love me. Right, blue eyes?”

Cas opens and closes his mouth in a way that reminds Dean of a fish. “I’m so sorry,” he finally manages. “I’m not quite sure who you are.”

For just a moment, Dean thinks he sees the confident smirk fall from Meg’s face, but it’s back again before he can be sure. “Nah, it’s cool. Guess all the good ones are gay, taken, or have early-onset Alzheimer’s Disease, huh?” She pats Cas’s cheek with something that might be good-natured teasing or might be affection. “Night, Mr. Novak.” She tosses Cas and Dean a two-fingered solute before switching off the light and carrying the tray out of the room.

Cas is still standing in the middle of the room when Dean climbs into bed. “Cas? You okay?”

“Who was she? The girl?” Cas asks. “I feel like I should know her but I just can’t, I can’t…”

“Come here,” Dean says softly, opening his arms in invitation for Cas to lay in them. Cas obliges, forgetting to take off his shoes and settling down into Dean’s arms with a sigh. Dean runs his fingers through the soft hair at the nape of Cas’s neck. It is becoming quite long.

“She’s no one important,” Dean says finally. Lying to Cas puts his stomach in knots, but he decides that, at this point, it might be better if Cas didn’t know how much he has forgotten. He continues to stroke the angel’s hair, focusing on the feeling in his fingertips and pushing down the one in his gut. “She’s just a nurse.”

*

Cas doesn’t remember falling asleep, but the next thing he knows, his eyes open to see a shadowy silhouette climbing out of bed. It takes him a moment to remember that it must be Dean. He looks out the window at the sky. It’s dark.

“Where are you going?” he asks drowsily.

Dean’s shoulders tense. “I didn’t mean to wake you,” he says. “Go back to sleep.”

“Are you leaving because I forget things?” He isn’t angry; he expected this. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt.

“What?” says Dean, turning to face him. The orange glow of the streetlights outside catches on his hair and the outline of his face, and Cas is reminded of the sun. “Cas, I’m not leaving you. Not permanently anyway. I’m just sneaking into Chuck’s room to talk to him about Becky.”

“Who?”

“Never mind. Just stay here. I’ll be right back, promise.” Cas feels a rush of cold air as Dean opens the window.

“Wait,” Cas says, scrambling out of bed. “I’m coming with you.”

“Cas,” Dean starts.

“I’m not really sure where you’re going or what you’re doing, but I know that if you’re sneaking out of a window late at night, it’s definitely stupid and dangerous. Which means I’m coming too.”

“It’s not that stupid and dangerous.”

“Then you’ll have no problem with me tagging along.”

Dean drags a hand across his face. It’s clear that he doesn’t have a counterargument. “Alright. Come on.”

A minute later, they are climbing through another window into a dark room that looks almost exactly like their own. In one bed lies a man hugging a sock puppet to his chest and snoring soundly. In the other sits a man frowning at his feet with his knees pulled up to his chest. He jumps when he sees them.

“What are you doing here?” he whispers harshly.

“We aren’t letting anything happen to Becky,” Dean whispers back. “We need a plan.”

“Yeah, well I’ve been sitting here trying to come up with one for the last hour, and short of busting out of here, finding her house, and hiring a body guard to watch over her, I’ve got nothing.”

“Let’s do that then. Minus the body guard, maybe. I’m a little short on cash. But we could at least tell her what’s going on.”

“And what good is that going to do?” the other man says a little too loudly. They all glance at the sleeping man’s bed. He’s still snoring. “Even if she does believe us, which is highly unlikely, how is that going to help her? So at least she’ll have some idea of what’s coming before whatever-it-is comes and steals her away? Great, I’m sure that will be a real comfort in her final moments.”

“Chuck. Chuck, listen to me.” Dean grabs the man’s wrists. “Becky is going to be fine. Even if she does disappear, we’ll find her. We’ll find all of them. I promise, okay?”

The man named Chuck exhales, shoulders slumping forward slightly. He nods.

As Cas watches Dean reassure Chuck that they will find this Becky person, he can’t help but wish that Dean could see what he sees. If there is one thing he remembers about Dean Winchester, it’s that even when he is broken beyond repair, he never stops trying to help others. He would go to the ends of the Earth to protect the people he cares about, and yet he thinks himself to be worthless, useless, nothing. Cas wishes he could find the words to convince Dean that he is wrong.

Because Dean is the most beautiful person—human or angel—that Cas has ever seen. And this fact has little to do with his outward appearance.

 _This is what love feels like to humans,_ he thinks suddenly. He wonders if the thought has ever occurred to him before.

“I have an idea,” he hears Dean say, snapping his fingers. “Things you write down come true, right? So just write that Becky is safe and that all the people who have disappeared are back.”

“You think I haven’t tried that?” Chuck says miserably. “Nothing works. I’m beginning to think that my writing really doesn’t have any effect on the outside world. Maybe I am just crazy after all.”

“Dude, so far, a list you wrote has caused six people to disappear. I don’t think that’s the issue. Maybe you just need to be asleep for it to happen? That’s how you wrote the list without knowing it, right?”

“Yeah, because I’m so good at controlling what I write in my sleep.”

“Okay, fair point. Maybe it’s not working because…because you just aren’t believing hard enough.”

Chuck shakes his head. “This isn’t Neverland.”

“Well maybe—”

“May I see the list?” Cas asks. Dean and Chuck turn to him with their eyebrows raised.

“Um, sure,” Chuck says, grabbing a wrinkled sheet of paper from his bedside table and handing it to Cas.

Cas studies it for a moment. “I think it might have something to do with these symbols.”

“I was wondering about those,” says Dean. “What are they?”

Chuck shrugs. “Your guess is as good as mine. I don’t even remember writing them.”

“They’re Enochian,” Cas explains. “The language of angels. I’ve forgotten how to read it now, but I think this word,” he points, “means something along the lines of ‘banish.’ And this one acts as a sort of lock.”

“Well there you go,” Dean says. “No wonder you can’t write anything that affects any of those people.”

“Does that mean I can still change other things with my writing?”

Dean shrugs. “Why don’t we test it out?”

Chuck nods. He takes the paper from Cas, opens a drawer, and pulls out a small wooden box with a lock on the front. He sets both items on his bedside table before retrieving a small key from inside his pillow and using it to unlock the box. Inside lies an ordinary ballpoint pen.

“You know, you could have just asked to borrow a pen,” Dean points out.

“It’s lucky,” Chuck says, hands trembling as he picks it up. On the back of the sheet of paper he writes, ‘ _Suddenly, a thousand dollars appeared before me._ ’ They wait. Nothing happens.

Chuck sighs. “That never worked before either.”

“Then why would you try it?” Cas asks.

“I just keep hoping.”

“Then what does work, usually?”

“Mundane things. Silly things. Things where I don’t even know the person I’m writing about until they’ve introduced themselves by the name of a character in my story, or where I don’t realize I’ve been using the name of my ex-boss until he’s in the news because he was in a terrible car accident that I wrote about. Basically any time I don’t want it or expect it to work, it does.”

“Sounds like I wasn’t too far off with the believing thing,” Dean says. “Except maybe you’re just believing too much.”

“No, I don’t think that’s it. Sometimes things I write about intentionally do come true, just often not in the way I expect. It’s all about chains of events that lead people to where I’ve written them.”

“Hm,” Cas says. “Then maybe it’s not the events you are influencing but the people.”

Chuck chews on his pen cap. “How so?”

“I think I get it,” Dean says. “Hey, I wanna try something.” He leans in close to Chuck and whispers something in his ear.

Chuck blushes, then nods and begins to write. “Wait,” he says, pausing with his pen in midair. “Who’s Castiel?”

“I am,” Cas says.

“I thought your name was Kurt.”

“I think it sometimes is.”

Chuck looks like he wants to argue, but he just shrugs and goes back to writing.

When he is finished, he and Dean look up at Cas expectantly. “Cas?” Dean says.

“Yes?”

“Is there something you’d like to do?”

“Not really.”

Dean frowns. “Damn, I really thought that would work.”

“It probably doesn’t work on me because I’m still not fully human.”

“You’re not _what_?” Chuck says.

“Oh yeah,” Dean says. “Cas is kind of an angel. And his name’s not Kurt. Minor details. Forgot to mention.”

“Minor? _Forgot?_ ”

Cas peers over Chuck’s shoulder at the sentence he wrote. ‘ _Castiel kisses Dean._ ’ He isn’t sure why Dean would want him to do such a thing, but he isn’t opposed to the idea. He is aware that he is having trouble remembering people, yet Dean remains comfortingly familiar. The former hunter has a way of making him feel safe and content just by being near, and Cas suspects that displaying his affection for him in such a close and personal way would only strengthen their bond. “If you want me to kiss you, all you need to do is ask,” he states.

For some reason, Dean finds this to be funny. He chuckles as he brings himself closer and takes Cas’s face in his hands. Dean kisses him gently, and the press of his lips is soft and familiar in a way that makes Cas think they must have done this before.

A throat is cleared, and they break apart. Chuck is looking more uncomfortable by the second. “Okay, so you’re an angel—one who apparently is involved with Dean in a manner that I don’t want to discuss. Why don’t you just use your angel powers to fix all this?”

Cas’s lazy, post-kiss smile fades. “I’m running a bit low on power these days.”

Chuck nods. “Well, let’s see if playing god works on Dean, shall we?” He cracks his knuckles and scribbles something on the paper.

They wait. “Well?” Dean says, scratching his arm absentmindedly.

Chuck breaks into a wide grin. “I’m not crazy,” he says, handing Dean the paper.

‘ _Dean scratches his left arm,_ ’ it reads.

“Seriously?” Dean asks. “That’s what you decided to make me do?”

“I really didn’t want to watch you make out with Mr. Kind-Of-An-Angel over there again. And this seemed harmless.”

“Fair enough. So, basically, you can use your writing thing to influence other people to do things. Now how do we use this to our advantage?”

“Well, first of all…” he writes something else on the paper. “There, that should keep the guards from looking into our rooms for the rest of the night…I hope. Now what?”

“We need Becky’s address,” Dean says. “If we can’t make her come to us, we’ll go to her. Do you think the hospital keeps a record of that somewhere that we could get to it?”

“Doesn’t matter,” says Chuck. “I have a better idea.”

 


	13. Uninvited Guests

“You’re sure this is the place?”

“Somewhat,” Chuck says, glancing from the paper in his hands to the run-down apartment in front of them and looking like he isn’t sure at all. “The fact that I wrote down an address that actually exists and is only a few blocks away is a good sign, I think.”

Dean shrugs. “It’s the best lead we’ve got.” He walks up the dirt path, Cas and Chuck close behind, and raps his knuckles on the door. A few flecks of grayish-blue paint crumble and fall.

A thump sounds from inside, followed by a muffled ‘oh fiddlesticks’and a light being switched on. Becky opens the door, hugging her pink bathrobe around her. Her mouth drops open, and for once she doesn’t smile.

Chuck is the first to wave. “Hey, Becky.”

Her eyes shift from Chuck to Dean to Cas and back again. She opens her mouth as if to say something, then holds up an index finger instead. “One second.”

She closes the door. They wait. She returns wearing a pair of black-rimmed glasses that Dean has never seen before.

“Okay,” Becky nods. “So it’s not a problem with my vision. Not that that makes me feel any better.”

“Beck…” Chuck starts.

She squeezes her eyes shut. “What are you guys doing here? No, better question, how did you _get_ here?” A pained look crosses her face. “Oh, this is punishment for that time I followed Justin Timberlake home after that concert in high school, isn’t it?” She casts her gaze up into the light-polluted sky. “I learned my lesson. Wasn’t the restraining order enough?”

“We aren’t stalking you,” Chuck says. “We’re here to save you from an unknown evil.”

“Oh, thank goodness. Wait. What?”

Dean drags a hand across his face. “Becky, do you mind if we come in to discuss this?”

She glances behind her, then nods. “Okay. But you have to be quiet.”

Becky’s apartment is small but much cozier than the outside would imply. Most of the furniture is well-worn and mismatched, but it's clean and it manages to look charmingly eclectic. Crayon drawings of rainbows and robots cover the fridge and one of the walls, and the whole room gives off an air of warmth that has nothing to do with the space heater in the corner. It’s a far cry from the stark white walls of the hospital.

Dean, Cas, and Chuck seat themselves on the garish (but very comfortable) orange couch while Becky sinks into a recliner covered in cat-patterned fabric. “So,” she says. “Um. About the unknown evil?”

“Kind of unknown,” Chuck clarifies. “We know what it does, but not really. And we don’t know exactly who’s responsible. Well, I’m sort of responsible. But not intentionally!” He glances around, rubbing his hands together. “Got any straws?”

“Um,” says Becky.

“I think what Chuck is trying to say,” Dean says, “is that you and a bunch of other people are in danger and we’re here to stop it. You know those recent disappearances at the hospital?”

Becky nods.

“Well apparently Chuck—”

“That’s me.”

“We know. Chuck wrote a list with those people’s names on it… _before_ they disappeared.”

“Oh,” says Becky. “And I’m…”

“On the list,” Dean nods. “We don’t know how much longer you’ve got, but if things continue the way they have, I’d say a couple weeks at most. Probably less.”

“So…Chuck really is God?”

“Or something. That’s what you choose to focus on?”

“I mean, it’s kind of a big deal.”

“I think so too,” Chuck adds.

“Bigger issues here, guys,” Dean says. “We need a plan. How are we going to protect—”

“Becky?”

Four heads turn towards the back hallway. A round-faced, dark-haired girl—Dean guesses six or seven years old—stands in a pair of purple pajamas, clutching a stuffed rabbit and rubbing her eye.

“Krissy, what are you doing up?” Becky crosses the room and scoops the girl into her arms. “Did we wake you?”

Krissy shakes her head. “I had a bad dream.” Her eyes find the couch. “Who are those people?”

“Some friends from work,” Becky tells her. “How about a glass of milk to make you feel better?”

“And cookies?”

Dean has seen Becky smile a lot over the last few months, but he isn’t sure he has ever seen her smile as softly as she does now. “Just one, okay?”

“Okay.” Becky sets the girl down. Krissy finds a pack of Oreos, taking one for herself and offering one to Becky.

“You should ask our guests if they would like one too,” Becky says, taking a cookie for herself.

Krissy still looks suspicious of them, but she walks towards the couch, stopping right in front of Chuck and silently holding out the package.

“Oh. Um. Thank you,” Chuck says, taking a cookie.

She hands the package to Cas and Dean, but her eyes never leave Chuck. “Did you have a bad dream too?” she asks.

“No,” Chuck says, twisting the chocolate wafers apart. “Why?”

“Because you look scared.”

“Come on, Krissy,” Becky says before Chuck can respond, handing her a glass of milk. “Take your snack and go back to bed. I’ll be there in a minute to check on you.”

“Okay,” Krissy says, trotting back to her room.

“Cute kid,” Dean says when she is gone. “Yours?”

Becky shakes her head as she reclaims her seat. “Sister. Our parents passed a few years back, so we’re all each other’s got now.”

Dean winces. “I’m sorry to hear that.” He means it.

“It’s okay. Our family might be small, but it’s enough. I love her more than anything in the world.”

If Dean thought he was determined to save Becky before, he is twice as determined now. “Becky, we have to do something. We don’t want to lose you, and I’m sure you don’t want to leave your sister.”

“Yeah, about that,” Becky says. “I was wondering…are you sure those people really just disappeared? They couldn’t have just left?”

“Well none of the doctors or nurses seemed to know anything about where they’d gone. Including you.”

“Yeah, but Dean, most people at the hospital don’t even bother to remember my name. You really think they remember to tell me when patients leave? And the doctors, I mean, I’m not trying to speak ill of my superiors, but they might have just said that to maintain patient confidentiality. Not everyone has as much trouble keeping their mouth shut as me.”

“Do you have any reason to believe that they might have just left?” Cas says, taking Chuck and Becky by surprise. He has spent most of the conversation looking like he has no idea what anyone is talking about. Only Dean has remained constantly aware of his presence.

“Well…just…these disappearances are all centered around the hospital, right?”

“Yeah,” Dean says.

“So…so what if I wasn’t at the hospital anymore?”

The men on the couch exchange glances. “Becky,” Chuck says tentatively. “Is there something you need to tell us?”

Becky worries her lip between her teeth. “I’m quitting my job,” she says finally.

“What? Because of this stupid list?” Chuck wads the paper up. “Becky, we’ll find a way to keep you safe, I swear.”

“No, it’s not that. I, um, I got a job offer at a hospital in Sherwood, Oregon. I gave Dr. MacLeod my two weeks notice today.”

“You’re leaving?” Chuck says. “To go to Oregon? But why?”

Tears are brimming in Becky’s eyes. She turns her head and wipes them away. “It’s not like I want to leave. I love my job, and I’ve grown so close to some of the patients, especially you guys. But this other job pays better, and it’s in a nicer town with fewer crimes and better schools, and if it was just me that wouldn’t matter, but…” She glances towards the back hallway.

Chuck nods. “I understand.” He is the first to get up from the couch. “Sorry for bothering you so late. We’ll go now.”

“Chuck…”

“You’re safe,” Chuck smiles. “That’s all that matters. But Becky?” He stands in front of her, eyes locked on hers.

“Yeah?”

“When I get out of Glenwood, I’m coming to find you.” His eyes widen as he realizes what he just said. “Not in a creepy stalker show-up-at-your-doorstep-in-the-middle-of-the-night way. Like a look-you-up-in-the-phone-book-and-give-you-a-call kind of way. Maybe we could go out for coffee sometime?”

Becky grins. “I’d like that.”

*

Dean is relieved to see Becky come into his room the next morning, smiling like the previous night never happened. He’s also glad that she doesn’t mention anything about it, as he’s pretty sure Cas doesn’t remember. He didn’t even remember to go back to his own bed that morning, but Becky doesn’t say anything about that either.

Chuck is waiting for him in his room when he gets back from his appointment with Dr. Sands. The bags under his eyes look even worse than they did the night before.

“I still think we should keep an eye on her,” he says without preamble. “We don’t know for sure that leaving of her own volition will be enough. What if it’s just a coincidence that she’s planning on leaving the hospital and something hurts her in the meantime?”

Cas squints. “What’s he talking about?”

“Nothing, man. I’ll tell you later. Look, Chuck, I meant what I said. I’ll do my best to keep anything from happening to Becky, but if she disappears anyway, I’ll help you find her. Everything’s going to be okay.” He hopes he sounds more confident than he feels.

“Yeah. Yeah, you’re probably right. Aren’t you?”

“I am. But I still need some help finding the others, if you’re willing to lend a hand. And I still want to know what’s causing this.”

“I thought we had established that this was my fault?”

“Nah, you don’t even understand those symbols you wrote. Someone else has to be making you do this somehow.”

“Someone else who controls people making me control other people through writing? I don’t know. Something’s wrong with that picture.”

“But you can’t just write in angel-language without even having heard of it before!”

“I shouldn’t be able to control people’s fates with pen and paper, but I can do that.”

“That’s different.”

“How? It’s just me having these crazy powers that I shouldn’t have and accidentally using them to destroy my life and the lives of everyone around me. Tell me how that’s different from anything else that has ever happened to me.”

Dean doesn’t have a good answer for that. “Can’t you just…do the thing you did last night to find Becky’s address? You know, sit there with your lucky pen and let the words ‘flow through you’ or whatever? Maybe it could give us another clue.”

“That’s incredibly dangerous. I shouldn’t have even done it last night. We’re lucky I didn’t accidentally cause a nuclear war doing that.”

“I’m running out of leads, man,” Dean says. “Please.”

A short staring contest ensues. Chuck is the first to break. “Fine. But don’t blame me if this ends in disaster.”

Minutes later, Chuck has retrieved his pen and a clean sheet of paper and is crouched in front of the bedside table in Dean and Cas’s room with his eyes closed.

“A little space,” he says. Dean backs up a few steps and joins Cas on the end of his bed.

Chuck inhales deeply, holds it for several seconds, and lets it out slowly. He touches his pen to the paper. Another breath, and he begins to write.

He writes for a long time. Dean can’t see what he’s writing, but more than once he thinks that he must have filled up the page by now. The pen moves faster and faster.

Chuck’s eyes fly open suddenly. He gasps, letting his pen fall to the floor. He looks down at what he has written, and he picks up the paper.

“Dean?” he says. His voice is shaking almost as badly as his hands. “What does this mean?” He hands the sheet to Dean, who reads it with Cas looking over his shoulder.

Covering every inch of the page, in handwriting that grows increasingly sloppy as it goes down, is the same sentence written over and over and over again.

_Dean Winchester has been damned._

*

Cas’s heart pounds as he reads the words. He isn’t sure why, but they sound all too familiar, and somehow he knows them to be true.

“No,” he breathes. He clutches Dean’s sleeve in his fist. _Dean is in trouble,_ he thinks. _Dean needs my help._ He wishes he knew how to help him.

He hears a gasp and looks up to find a bearded man staring up in awe. Above him is a cloud of black smoke, shrieking and swirling and causing the paper to blow out of Dean’s hands and onto the floor.

The smoke enters the man’s open mouth, flowing into him with a mighty howl. The man falls backwards.

A moment later, he picks himself up, staring down at his scrubs and brushing some imaginary dust off his chest as if nothing happened. He walks towards Cas and Dean, and Cas can’t help the chill that goes down his spine when the man looks up and stares at him with eyes blacker than night.

“Hey, Cas,” he says, smiling cruelly. “Long time no see.”


	14. Where Demons Hide

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: This chapter contains violence. Nothing super graphic, I think, but let me know if I'm wrong about that. Also, there is a brief mention of suicide/drug overdose. Apologies in advance if this upsets anyone.

When the pain subsides from Dean’s head, he sees that he has backed Chuck against a wall, one hand wrapped around the man’s throat and the other pulled back in a fist.

 _Not Chuck,_ he reminds himself as after-images of dozens of black eyes swim through his vision. He lets his fist collide with the monster’s jaw.

It laughs, strained and hoarse from the pressure on its windpipe. Dean punches again. It doesn’t stop. Neither does Dean.

“Dean,” Cas says sternly. “Stop!” Suddenly, the holy power that Dean thought his friend lost long ago is back, and Dean has the strangest urge to get down on his knees and bow. He lets his fist drop, but he keeps his other hand on the monster’s neck.

“The man that he possessed is still in there,” Cas says. “Don’t do anything that you will regret.”

Dean nods, but he doesn’t let go. “Who are you?” he growls. The monster smirks.

“Thought you would have figured that out by now. I came all the way here just because your writer friend pulled that little stunt.” It cranes its borrowed neck around his shoulder to grin at Cas. “He knows. Don’t you, angel? Though I suppose that name is no longer fitting.”

Dean twists around, his eyebrows raised in silent question. Cas nods. “I sensed it in him the moment he arrived. I don’t know how it’s possible, but…he’s you.”

“He’s what?”

He looks back at the monster, but instead of seeing a black-eyed Chuck, a familiar pair of green eyes stare back at him. He reels back a few steps, releasing his grip on its neck.  _His own neck._

“Pretty neat trick, huh?” says a voice that sounds exactly like his own. “Not just any demon can do that. But then, I’m not just any demon.”

“What’d you do with Chuck?” Dean demands.

“Your little friend is fine,” it says, rolling Dean’s eyes. “Still here, in fact. What you’re looking at is an illusion. A pretty damn good one, if I do say so myself. Unfortunately, my true vessel can’t travel between dimensions, so I had to leave it at home. Luckily, I can make this one look just as pretty.”

“You’re using my body as a vessel in the other world?”

“I don’t think you get it, Dean.” The demon stalks towards him, stopping about a foot away. Though they are the same height, the demon seems much taller. “I’m not just some demon that regularly uses your body as a meat suit. I am _you_.”

“Not in my world, you’re not.”

“Yes, in your world.” He pushes his sleeve up and points to a symbol that appears to be burned into the flesh of his inner forearm. It looks unsettlingly familiar. “See that? That’s the Mark of Cain. You know Cain. Father of Murder? First Knight of Hell? Only one left, actually,” he smirks. “Except me, of course.”

“So you have some weird-ass burn mark tattoo. What does that have to do with anything?”

“God, was I always this stupid? It’s like your brain gets so muddled with _emotions_ and _feelings_ you can’t think straight.” He shakes his head as though he’s disappointed. “It’s not a tattoo. It was the source of Cain’s power, and it’s the source of mine. Well, that and the First Blade.” He gives a low whistle. “You still haven’t remembered her, I guess. You think you love your car? Sammy?” He points to Cas. “That guy? The First Blade is the best friend you’ve ever had. The way she makes you feel…even sex doesn’t compare.”

“And that’s what made me into this? That’s what turned me into a demon?”

“Don’t say it like it’s a bad thing. Becoming a Knight of Hell was the best thing that ever happened to us! Well, happened to me anyway.” His eyes drag up and down Dean’s body. “Guess I can’t say the same for you.”

“That’s another thing. You keep talking like we’re the same person from the same world, but that doesn’t make any sense. We can’t be in two places at once. So if you’re me as a demon, what does that make me?”

“You still don’t know?” He points at Dean’s chest. “You’re my soul. Or you have it, anyway.”

“That means you’re…”

“Without a soul and without a care, and loving every minute of it.”

“But then how did my soul end up in this world?”

“Well it started with…You know what? It’s easier just to show you.” He reaches out with two fingers, and Dean dodges to the side. The demon rolls his eyes. “I’m not going to kill you.”

Dean isn’t convinced, but he figures he doesn’t have much left to lose anymore. He lets the demon press its fingers against his forehead.

“You can join in too, angel,” the demon tells Cas. “Not like you’ll remember any of it for very long, but you should at least know what’s going on when Soul Man over here goes ape-shit.”

Dean expects Cas to be uncertain, but he walks over to where they are standing with a look of pure determination in his eyes. He doesn’t flinch when the demon touches his forehead.

“Hang on, boys,” the demon says. “It’s going to be a bumpy ride.”

*

The cave they are standing in looks a lot like the one that was the result of Dean and Cas’s mind-meld all those months ago, except this one feels much larger and reeks of sulfur. Cas is standing next to him again, and so is the demon wearing Dean’s face.

“Come on,” the demon says, walking towards an entryway Dean hadn’t previously noticed. “This is where we’ll start.”

“How can you possibly know what memory we’re going to?” Dean asks. “When I was here before, they were all out of order.”

“That’s because you can’t navigate your way out of a paper bag. I’m telling you, souls don’t do anything but mess up your brain.”

The first room they enter has white walls and bed sheets that are reminiscent of the ones at Glenwood. It would be almost comforting if not for the return of his throbbing headache and the man lying unconscious in the bed.

“Sammy?” Dean says as another version of himself asks, _“You still able to cure things after the fall?”_

 _ _“_ Yes,” _responds a man that Dean doesn’t recognize. _“I should be, but…he’s so weak.”_

The demon yawns. “Boring. Moving on.”

The next room shows the other Dean speaking with the man again—an angel named Ezekiel, Dean now knows—begging him to save his brother’s life. The angel suggests a solution that he doesn’t like the sound of.

_“There’s no way in hell he’d say yes to being possessed by anything.”_

_“He would rather die,”_ Ezekiel observes _. “I’ll leave you two alone then.”_

He is almost out the door when Dean hears himself say, _“Wait.”_

The scene that follows is hard to watch, but Dean forces his eyes to stay open as he watches Kevin’s get burned out of his head. The young prophet crumples to the floor, smoke rising from the empty sockets.

Sam is furious when he finds out what Dean did to keep him alive. Dean can’t blame him.

When Dean receives the Mark of Cain in order to kill a Knight of Hell named Abaddon, the demon leans in close to his ear and whispers, “This is when it starts to get good.”

As he watches himself grow more and more dependent on the jagged weapon known as the First Blade, using it both on creatures he should and shouldn’t kill, he thinks his demon self has a pretty twisted definition of good. The wildness in his eyes when he loses himself after a kill terrifies him.

“That’s when you first started to escape,” the demon says. “Castiel was right about your psychic connections with versions of yourself from other dimensions. When things started getting too bloody, you’d find a door and go to one of them, and I would get to take over for a little while. You see, Dean, I’m not just you as a demon, and I’m not just you without a soul. I’m smarter. I’m more powerful. And it was too much for you. I am more than you could ever hope to be, and you couldn’t handle it. Typical.”

Dean punches him in the nose. The demon laughs.

He watches himself die again, redeeming himself to his brother in his final moments with an uncharacteristic _“I’m proud of us.”_ The room goes dark.

“’Fraid this is where your memories before the hospital cut off,” the demon says, waving a hand and bringing them back to the cave entrance. “You hightailed it out of there as fast as you could in search of another dimension—one far away from me. It was pure luck that you managed to find one so wonderfully horrible. And with a vacant body too!”

Dean pinches the bridge of his nose, willing away the headache caused by remembering so many things at once. “What are you on about now?”

“Oh, you didn’t know? The Dean that actually belonged in a mental hospital? He’s dead. OD’d on smack. That’s how you were able to find such a convenient place for your soul to go. No need for sharing. Unfortunately, the body had been dead just long enough to cause brain damage, and you couldn’t bring any memories with you, since you were just a mindless soul. But the psychic connection to your former body—that’s yours truly—was still there. The memories you’ve regained are just the ones that slipped through the cracks.”

“But why would that version of Dean overdose on heroin?” Cas asks.

“Yeah, Dean,” the demon taunts. “Got any theories as to why that might be?”

Dean wants to lash out, wants to punch him again, but instead he says, “He just wanted the pain to stop.”

The demon whoops in delight, his eyes flashing black. “Ding ding ding! You finally got one! At least you recognize your own personal hell when you see it.”

“Hell?” Cas squints. “The hospital? That doesn’t look like any hell I’ve ever seen.”

“Sam’s dead, Cas,” Dean says, staring at his feet. “In that place, my baby brother is dead, all my friends except for you are gone, and soon you’ll be gone too. And I can’t do anything about it. I-I can’t do anything about anything! I can’t make my life worth anything. I can’t save people because I’m crazy, and no one listens to crazy people. If this isn’t hell, it might as well be.” The feelings he has been trying to deny since his first day at the hospital all hit him at once, and his legs collapse beneath him. Over the pounding in his ears, he hears the demon laugh.

Warm hands clasp around his own, and he looks up to find a pair of worried blue eyes gazing back at him. “You are not crazy.”

Dean shakes his head. “What difference does it make?”

*

When Dean recovers enough to let Cas help him up off the cave floor, the demon takes them to another room, saying, “Let’s see what your angel has been up to, shall we?”

The room he takes them to is dark and cold, the smell of sulfur stronger than ever.

“This is Cas’s mind?” Dean asks, raising an eyebrow.

“Don’t be an idiot,” the demon says. “The memories Cas has lost aren’t coming back. This one’s mine.”

 _“What have you done with him,”_ some previous version of Castiel demands, pointing a blade at a man who looks like Dean.

_“Now is that any way to greet your best friend?”_

_“What?”_

The demon shows him the Mark of Cain, still burned into his skin. _“Remember this?”_

Cas feels sick. The version of himself in the demon’s memory looks like he feels the same. _“It did this to you?”_

_“Is that such a bad thing?”_

_“Yes.”_

_“Aw, come on Cas. It’s still me. I’m just…better now. Stronger. Less hung up on little things like family and relationships.”_

_“No, you’re not.”_

The demon pauses, brows furrowed.  _“Come again?”_

_“You’re not better, and you’re definitely not him. Not anymore.”_

The demon’s eyes go black. “ _You know, I’m not just any demon. I’m a Knight of Hell, owner of the first blade. I could kill anything and anyone I want, including you, and no one could stop me. I’d be careful what I say, if I were you. Whatever sentiment I felt for you is quickly fading.”_

Instead of getting angrier, Cas’s eyes soften. _“You can’t feel anymore, can you?”_ He places his hands on either side of the demon’s face. The demon scowls, but Cas maintains eye contact.

 _“I’m going to fix this,”_ Cas promises. _“I don’t care how difficult it is or how long it takes. I’m going to fix you.”_

 _“You ever think that maybe I don’t want to be fixed?”_ the demon says, almost shouting as he breaks free of Cas’s hands. _“That maybe I’m happier this way?”_

The angel shakes his head. _“You can’t feel happiness anymore.”_ Cas can see the light bulb go off behind his former self’s eyes. _“Oh. But he still can.”_

_“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”_

_“Yes you do. Your soul. It’s still around somewhere, and that’s how I’m going to fix this.”_

_“Yeah? And how do you know that my soul wasn’t destroyed when I died?”_

_“Because when I said I was going to fix you, you looked scared.”_

_“Okay, lets say my soul is still around. How exactly do you plan on finding it? It could be anywhere, hiding in any dimension. And if I’m correct, you don’t have a lot of time.”_

_“You’re right. I don’t know where it is.”_ Cas quickly presses his fingers to the demon’s forehead. _“But I think you do.”_

There is a flash of light, and then they are back in the cave.

*

“You knew?” Dean demands, turning to face Cas. “When you first came here, you knew that I was a demon and you didn’t tell me?”

“This is as good as I imagined,” the demon says. His gleeful expression has Dean picturing him sitting back with a bowl of popcorn.

“I’m sorry,” Cas whispers. “I don’t remember my reasons for keeping that from you, but I assume I did it to prevent you from getting upset. Dean, I’m so sorry.”

“I can testify to that,” the demon chimes in. “I’ve been keeping an eye on you losers since the beginning, and poor little Cassy just wanted to keep his Dean happy until he found a way to bring him home. Too bad he forgot what he was doing there so soon after arriving.”

“And what about you?” Dean asks. “How do you factor into the disappearances?”

The demon groans. “We’ve been over this. Personal hell, remember? You know as well as I do that choosing a world where you would be miserable was no accident. It was a punishment. You weren’t supposed to go and make _friends._ Luckily, I was able to remedy the situation for you. That little god friend of yours was very helpful. Yes, before you ask, he really was a god. A very minor one, so don’t get too excited. Didn’t even have any influence over angels, but he did save me the time and effort of getting rid of people myself. All I had to do was pop over here long enough to possess him, get him to write down a few names, and presto! Dean is friendless and depressed once again. It was kind of fun, actually.”

“Yeah, well, fun’s over, you sick son of a bitch. I’m going to find the people you did away with, if they are still alive, and I’m going to make sure you don’t hurt anyone else.”

“Hurt anyone else? Dean, did you ever consider the possibility that maybe I’m not the villain here?”

“Didn’t really occur to me, no.”

“Hey, I’m not the one who sent you to that world, and I didn’t hurt your friends. The truth? Oh, the truth is so much better.” He grins wildly. “They left you. Every last one of them left you, and they did it all on their own. Okay, so I may have had some role in putting the idea in their heads or pushing ideas that were already there, but they left of their own free will, and only Benny and the nurse bothered to tell you they were leaving. The rest couldn’t wait around long enough for that. And all I did was give them a push.”

“Wait, so…they’re okay?”

“Dunno. Probably. Some of them were able to check out, others found a way to sneak out. They aren’t my problem anymore, and they definitely aren’t yours.”

“But what exactly was the reason for making them leave?” Cas asks. “Just to upset Dean?”

“Like I said, he’s here to be punished. And there’s no better punishment for Dean than leaving him all alone.” He stalks towards Dean, staring him down. “I know you Dean. I know your greatest fears and your biggest weaknesses. I know that deep down you know you don’t deserve to be saved. What you deserve is punishment from the person who knows you best and hates you most, and no one hates Dean Winchester more than himself.”

He kicks Dean in the knee, and Dean tumbles to the ground. “Old trick knee from a ghost hunt gone wrong when you were twenty-two. Hurts even when it’s only happening in your mind. Who else would know about that? Who else would know that you’d be willing to let the people you claim to love suffer if it means they don’t leave you?”

His foot collides with Dean’s face, breaking his nose. Cas rushes to help him, but the demon lifts a hand and Cas flies back into the cave wall, slumping over when he hits the ground. “Sammy knew.” He kicks Dean in the stomach. “He experienced your selfishness first hand.” Kick. “So you found yourself a sad little world where Sam was dead,” kick, “and all your friends left you,” kick, “and even the great Castiel would leave you eventually.” Kick. “You always did have a thing for the angel. How does it feel to know that he’s going to leave you too? That soon he’ll forget about you and leave like all the others?”

“You’re wrong,” Dean says between coughs, ignoring the blood and saliva that coat the ground beneath him.

“Oh really? You think that wannabe angel will have some reason to stay with you when he can’t even remember your name? That he’ll find you to be so great that he’ll fall in love with you all over again and you’ll get to live happily ever after? Well I’ve got news for you, sunshine.” He leans down, whispering in Dean’s ear conspiratorially. “It ain’t gonna happen.”

“Not that,” he croaks. “You’re wrong about not caring. Cas was wrong too. You care.”

“You think so?” He doesn’t sound convinced.

“I think there’s still a part of my soul in you too. A residue you just can’t scrub clean. You could have killed Cas and the others, but they aren’t the ones you hate. That’s me.”

The demon scoffs but doesn’t argue.

“You still hate me for betraying Sam and for all the other shit I’ve done. Hell, even with all my memories gone, I hated myself for it too. But you know what? I’m done.” He pulls himself up, standing on wobbly legs to look the demon in the eye. He wipes at the blood streaming from his nose. “You may still feel regret, but if this is what hating myself turns me into? Someone who hurts myself and the people I care about as some sort of twisted self-punishment? Then I don’t want any part of it.”

“You don’t realize just how much you’ve done,” the demon says, growing angry. “How many people you’ve made suffer with your own selfishness and stupidity!”

“Maybe not,” Dean says. “But I’m okay with that. The way I see it, this is my chance to start over, do better by myself and my friends. And I’m taking it.”

“You want to see all the times you brought your brother back to life after he finally found some peace in death?” the demon shouts. “How about all the times you let your father down? All the romantic partners you’ve put in danger because you wouldn’t give up the family business? Or the time you dragged Sam away from the life he loved and back into one of danger and monsters and family drama! Could you forgive yourself then?”

Dean barely hears him. His eyes are on the man lying unconscious on the cave floor. And suddenly, he remembers.

The scene changes, and he sees the inside of an old barn, a man walking towards him looking completely unfazed as bullets tear holes in his trench coat and bury themselves in his skin.

_“Who are you?”_

_“I’m the one who gripped you tight and raised you from perdition.”_

This Castiel is different from the one he knows. More confident, more powerful. Less human. As they talk, lightning strikes, and the shadow of enormous wings appears on the wall behind him. In the cave, Dean gasps.

_“What’s the matter? You don’t think you deserve to be saved.”_

He remembers park benches and car rides, phone calls and brothels. He remembers laughing so hard that tears streamed down his cheeks and screaming until his face was red. He remembers betrayal, and he remembers forgiveness. He remembers Castiel, brainwashed and ruthless, dropping his blade and healing Dean instead of killing him.

“Yes,” he tells the demon. “I forgive myself, and I forgive you. Whatever we did in the past, and whatever you did while I was away, I forgive you. Because Cas always forgives me, and he deserves better than someone who does nothing but sabotage himself.”

“No you don’t!” The demon screams as Dean wraps his arms around him tightly. “You don’t deserve forgiveness! I don’t deserve forgiveness! Not after the shit I’ve done!”

“It’s okay,” Dean says. He’s not sure whether he is talking to the demon or himself, but he thinks it doesn’t really matter anymore. “Everything is going to be okay.”

He feels a cloud of smoke envelop him, and there is a flash of something dark yet bright. The ground shakes beneath his feet. The walls of the cave begin to crumble and fall. He closes his eyes and hangs on.

Then, suddenly, it’s over. The shaking stops and the pain in his stomach and nose where the demon kicked him is gone. He cracks his eyes open slowly, and a winding road stretches out before him. He realizes he is lying in soft grass on the side of the road, and he laughs.

He’s not sure how, but the feeling in his gut tells him that he is home.


	15. Feels Like Home

The first thing Dean does is find Sam.

It isn’t difficult. He drives from state to state in the beaten up hatchback he took from a gas station parking lot, following suspicious news stories. Along the way, he takes out a nest of vampires and a couple of angry spirits. It calms his nerves a little.

It takes about two weeks for his path to cross his brother’s. He finds Sam in a motel room in Louisville, Kentucky, pouring over an ancient book for his latest job. The younger Winchester hops to his feet as soon as Dean walks in, grabbing the demon knife and pointing it at his chest.

“I thought I told you to leave me the hell alone,” Sam snarls.

“It’s okay,” Dean tells him, rolling up his sleeve to reveal the unblemished skin where the Mark of Cain used to be. “It’s just me.” He spies a bottle of holy water near the door, grabs it, and takes a swig.

“Dean?” Sam says, voice shaking.

“Hey, Sammy.”

The knife clatters to the floor.

The bone-crushing hug Sam gives him is embarrassing and nearly cracks his ribs, but he’s so happy to see his little brother that he hugs back anyway.

It takes him several hours to recount his experiences over the last few months to his brother (mostly because Sam keeps interrupting to ask questions), but he finally manages to convince him that somehow, when he combined with his other self, both the demon and the Mark of Cain were destroyed. He even shows him the ominous note from Lucifer that is addressed to “Adam or Sam, depending on whether or not Dean made it back to his own world.” The only other thing it says is, “See you soon.” It makes Sam uneasy, so they agree not to worry about it yet.

“I just have one last question,” Sam says.

Dean sighs, but he can’t help but smile. He really did miss his annoying little brother. “Shoot.”

“What happened to Cas?”

His smile falls. “I don’t know,” Dean says. “I don’t even know how I managed to end up back here. For all I know, Cas is still back in that mental hospital.”

“Yeah, or he could be here. We should look for him.”

“I wouldn’t know where to begin. Cas has no reason to travel in a pattern like you do.”

“But we can still try,” Sam insists.

Dean isn’t sure he wants to set himself up for that, for the disappointment of looking for Cas and never finding him—or worse, finding him dead—but Sam gives him his best puppy eyes and he can’t say no.

Sam spends weeks pouring over books on parallel universes, trying to figure out likely spots where Cas might have been sent and where he might have gone after. They try the version of Glenwood Springs that exists in this dimension. They travel all over the country and even into Canada. No one seems to have seen anyone who looks like Cas.

The ideas Sam has about where to look come further and further apart. One day, after a few months and another failed attempt, Sam turns to him in the Impala and says “I’m sorry,” and Dean knows they have given up.

Life goes on.

They hunt monsters and save people when they can, and Dean tries not to blame himself when a case goes wrong. He chooses to ignore the sympathetic look his brother gives him whenever Sam knows he’s thinking about Cas. Dean doesn’t even mention Cas’s name anymore, but Sam always seems to know anyway. 

He still thinks about the hospital sometimes, about the friends he made there and their alternate universe counterparts. Many of them, he realizes, are dead in this world. He hopes the ones from Glenwood fared better. When he runs into Becky Rosen one day while working a case near a Supernatural convention (he now remembers that Chuck has caused him a lot of trouble in both worlds), he doesn't hesitate to give her a hug. She seems surprised, but she hugs him back and gives him a brilliant smile. It makes him feel like everything is going to be okay.

*

The forest is beautiful. Snowflakes cover the ground and the tree branches, powder-white and delicate in a way that can only come from the first snow of the year. It might be pleasant if it wasn’t so biting cold and if he had any idea where he was.

The man checks himself for identification, something to tell him who he is, but all he finds is a small notebook stuffed into the waistband of his white cotton pants.

Most of the pages are filled with bulleted lists—locations, daily activities, likes and dislikes—dated at the top like diary entries. He isn’t sure if any of the names in the journal are his own, but there’s one name written in large letters on an otherwise empty page, and it seems to fit.

One of the pages is dog-eared, the paper made dirty by frequent touches with oily hands. He reads the words. They seem familiar.

_Sept 25—Salt Lake City, Utah_

_Things not to forget:_

  * _Dean Winchester is the best person you know_
  * _Dean is stuck in a world that is not his own and he needs to get out_
  * _Dean has light brown hair, green eyes, and freckles_
  * _Dean loves pie, rock and roll, his car (baby???), and his brother Sam_
  * _Dean always puts others before himself (don’t let him do this for you, even if it makes him angry)_



_Update (Oct 24)_

  * _Dean’s friends ~~have disappeared~~ are disappearing and he wants you to help him find out what happened to them_



_Update (Oct 27)_

  * _Dean lets you kiss him sometimes and sleep in the same bed with him at night as long as you go back to your own bed before the nurse comes in at 8 AM_



_Update (Nov 16)_

  * _You love him_



He walks until his feet are sore, and then he keeps walking. His hands and nose grow numb from the cold, and he eventually decides to stop in a bus station on the side of the road to warm up. He asks a gray-haired woman what city he is in, but she just clutches her purse and walks away.

He finds a soggy ten dollar bill on the bus station’s bathroom floor and buys a ticket for one of the towns mentioned in the notebook. Maybe he will find answers there.

That night, he falls asleep on the bus reading the notebook. When he reaches his destination, it gets left on the seat, forgotten.

*

It’s almost a year later, when they are hunting a rugaru in Idaho, that Dean runs into him in a grocery store.

“I am so sorry,” the man says, picking up the box of salt and the low-fat yogurt that Sam asked for and placing them back in Dean’s basket. Dean, for his part, is staring with his mouth open, doing absolutely nothing to help clean up the mess that was probably his fault in the first place.

“That’s alright,” he mumbles finally. “I, uh, wasn’t looking where I was going.”

The man stands up and smiles. He doesn’t look as tired as he did the last time Dean saw him, and his eyes don’t hold the same sadness, but other than that he looks the same.

“This might sound strange,” the man says, tilting his head to one side, “but have we met? My memory isn’t very good, and you look so familiar.”

Dean opens his mouth to respond, but then he looks closer. Something else about this man has changed. He has only seen him look this way a few times before, and suddenly Dean realizes what it is.

He looks happy.

“No,” Dean says. “No, I don’t think we’ve met. Dean Winchester.” He sticks out his hand.

“Kurt Novak,” the man who used to be Cas replies, shaking his hand. “It’s nice to meet you.”

Dean smiles. “Nice to meet you too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you've made it this far, thank you for sticking through until the end! This is the first Supernatural fic I've ever completed and the first fanfic I've written in a long time. I hope that I did okay and that some of you enjoyed it.
> 
> Giant thank you to everyone who left comments/kudos or who bookmarked/subscribed to this story. It means a whole lot to me. And, of course, one more enormous thank you to my beta reader, Ashley (cloudbruja06). Which brings me to my next point...
> 
> My beta pointed out that this fic has a very open-ended ending. While I felt that this was the way the story should end, I understand that it does leave quite a bit of room for more to be said. Which is why I've started writing a sequel. Right now it's still very much a teeny tiny baby fic, and I don't know where it's going, and because I'm back in school now it would probably be a while before it was up. But if, theoretically, the inspiration fairy sprinkled his/her magic writer dust on me and if I found the time to write it, would anyone be interested in a sequel?
> 
> Update: First few chapters of the sequel are now up!
> 
> Thanks again for reading! I hope you all have a fantastic day.


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